LI  B  RAFIY 

OF   THL 

UN  I  VER.SITY 

or    ILLINOIS 

Z.SZ, 
B2.8au 


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UNIVERSITY    OF     ILLINOIS    LIBRARY    AT    URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 


JUN      3 


1  1  1981 

1981 


Wfl 


m 


19J3 


3 .;  '93 


L161— O-1096 


ACORNS 


-FROM  AN 


Oak  Park  Pulpit 


-Sermons  by- 


WILLIAM  E.  BARTON,  D.  D. 


ACORNS   FROM   AN 
OAK  PARK  PULPIT 


BY 

WILLIAM  E.  BARTON,  D.  D 

PASTOR    OF    THE 
FIRST  CONGREGATIONAL  CHURCH 

OAK    PARK,    ILLINOIS 


V 


0nk  ^ark 

tEfje  puritan  ^rc£(S 

1910 


FOREV70RD 

These  sermons,  delivered  in  the  First  Congregational  Church, 
Oak  Park,  during  1910,  have  been  printed  by  the  generosity 
of  men  of  the  congregation,  and  distributed  month  by  month. 
While  each  sermon  was  on  the  press,  400  extra  copies  were 
printed  and  laid  aside  to  be  bound  into  this  present  form. 

From  many  persons,  some  of  them  at  a  distance,  gratifying 
letters  of  thanks  have  come  during  the  year.  The  sermons 
have  been  appreciated  by  people  formerly  connected  with  the 
First  Church,  by  families  living  at  a  distance  from  church 
privileges,  and  by  others.  Some  of  them  have  been  read  in 
churches  temporarily  without  a  pastor.  The  thanks  of  the 
minister  are  due  the  men  who  have  given  them  this  wider 
circulation. 


Z5X 


CONTENTS 

WHO   WORE   THE    OTHER   CROWN?   1 

OUR   REASONABLE   SERVICE   17 

SEEING   AND   BELIEVING   25 

THE  RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 33 

THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 49 

COSMIC    REDEMPION   65 

THE  TEMPTATION  IN  THE  WILDERNESS  89 

THE   WORLD   TO   COME   105 

THE    DIVINE   DEPOSIT   116 

THE   GLORY  OF   FATHERHOOD   121 

THE  MEANING  AND  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  LIFE  137 


672989 


WBi)o  More  ti)t  (Bti)tx  Croton? 


M  Cfjapter  from  tte  Secret  ^igtorp  of  tfje  ^Ib  tlTesitament 

And  the  word  of  Jehovah  came  unto  me  saying,  Take 
silver  and  gold  and  make  crowns,  and  set  them  upon  the  head 
of  Joshua  the  son  of  Jehozadek,  the  high  priest,  and  speak  unto 
him,  saying,  Thus  speaketh  Jehovah  of  hosts,  saying.  Behold, 
the  man  whose  name  is  the  Branch;  and  he  shall  grow  up  out 
of  his  place,  and  he  shall  build  the  temple  of  Jehovah;  and  he 
shall  bear  the  glory,  and  shall  sit  and  rule  upon  his  throne; 
and  there  shall  be  a  priest  upon  his  throne;  and  the  counsel 
of  peace  shall  be  between  them  both.  And  the  crowns  shall  be 
to  Helem,  and  to  Tobijah,  and  to  Jedaiah,  and  to  Hen  the  son 
of  Zephaniah,  for  a  memorial  in  the  temple  of  Jehovah.  Zech- 
ariah  6:11-14. 

If  you  are  interested  in  stories  that  have  a  mystery 
about  them,  and  which  invite  you  to  a  little  detective 
work,  you  will  enjoy  this  text.  It  is  our  clue  to  one  of 
the  most  interesting  episodes  in  the  secret  history  of  the 
people  of  the  Bible.  There  were  two  crowns,  and  one 
man  is  declared  to  have  been  crowned.  What  became  of 
the  other  crown?  Moreover,  while  the  one  man  who  is 
named  is  crowned,  the  address  of  coronation  is  all  about 
the  other  man.  Here  is  an  inviting  mystery,  and  one 
which  it  is  well  worth  our  while  to  solve. 

Let  us  get  one  question  out  of  the  way  at  the  outset ; 
were  there  really  two  crowns?  For  some  of  the  old 
texts  speak  of  only  one  crown,  and  represent  Joshua  as 
both  priest  and  representative  of  royalty.  No;  there 
were  two  crowns,  and  if  there  were  not,  the  one  man 
crowned  was  the  other  man.  When  we  read  the  pas- 
sage through  carefully  we  can  see  why  some  old  scribe, 
half  awake,  copying  this  book  in  manuscript,  and  noting 
that  there  were  two  crowns,  and  that  only  one  man  was 
named,  thought  to  simplify  the  matter  by  changing  the 
two  crowns  to  one  crown ;  and  living,  probably  not  earl- 


WHO       WORE      THE       OTHER       CROWN? 

ier  than  the  Alaccabean  times,  when  there  was  a  line  of 
priest  kings,  it  seemed  to  him  that  the  whole  matter  was 
made  clear  by  crowning  one  man,  a  priest-king.  But  the 
scribes  do  not  help  us  by  these  little  devices.  There 
were  two  men,  and  one  of  them  was  a  priest,  who  was 
to  sit  very  near  to  the  king  on  his  throne,  and  the  coun- 
sel of  peace  was  to  be  between  them  both.  But  with 
him  there  was  another  "son  of  oil ;"  and  other  "Anointed 
one,"  whose  person  is  described  under  the  figure  of  "The 
Branch." 

The  figure  of  "The  Branch"  is  familiar  to  us.  Isaiah 
told  the  people  of  his  day  that  a  day  was  coming  when 
"The  Branch  of  Jehovah"  should  be  glorious  in  Jerusa- 
lem (Is.  4:2.)  He  said  that  this  "Branch,"  who  was 
evidently  a  man,  was  to  spring  out  of  the  roots  of  David, 
and  bear  fruit  (Is.  11  :i  seq)  ;  and  he  drew  a  glowing 
picture  of  the  good  time  coming  when  this  scion  of 
David  should  break  forth  out  of  dry  ground,  and  make 
the  resting  place  of  Jehovah  glorious.  Jeremiah  used  the 
same  figure  of  speech,  and  in  the  same  sense,  saying, 
"Behold  the  days  come,  saith  Jehovah,  when  I  will  raise 
up  unto  David  a  righteous  Branch,  and  he  shall  reign  as 
king."  (Jer.  23:5.)  And  still  again,  "In  those  days  and  at 
that  time,  will  I  cause  a  Branch  of  righteousness  to  grow 
up  unto  David.  For  thus  saith  Jehovah,  David  shall 
never  want  a  man  to  sit  upon  the  throne  of  the  house 
of  Israel."     (Jer.  33:14-17.) 

Every  one  in  Jerusalem  understood  what  was  meant 
when  The  Branch  was  spoken  of;  it  was  the  lineal  de- 
scendant of  David,  come  to  Jerusalem  to  sit  upon  the 
throne  of  his  father  David. 

Now  the  story  of  this  secret  coronation,  in  which 
there  were  two  crowns,  tells  us  that  one  of  these  royal 
emblems  was  placed  upon  the  head  of  Joshua  the  high 

—2— 


WHO   WORE   THE   OTHER   CROWN? 

priest,  and  then  in  the  context  it  repeatedly  described 
another  man ;  and  to  make  it  perfectly  clear  to  the  initiat- 
ed just  who  was  meant,  and  what  his  relations  were  to 
the  ceremony,  it  repeatedly  calls  him  "The  Branch." 
"Hear  now,  O  Joshua,  I  will  bring  forth  my  servant, 
The  Branch  .  .  ..  and  he  shall  sit  upon  his  throne."  (Zech- 
ariah  3:8.) 

This  is  not  Joshua  himself.  It  is  another  man  stand- 
ing with  him,  and  representing  in  the  affairs  of  state 
what  Joshua  represents  in  the  temple  as  a  priest.  The 
prophet  emphasizes  the  fact  that  there  were  two  men; 
not  the  man  wearing  two  crowns,  but  two  men.  "And 
he  answered  me  the  second  time,  and  said,  Knowest  thou 
not  what  these  are?  And  I  said,  No,  my  lord.  Then 
said  he,  These  are  the  two  anointed  ones,  that  stand  by 
the  Lord  of  the  whole  earth."    Nehemiah  4:13-14. 

This  makes  it  perfectly  plain  that  there  were  two, 
and  indeed  the  whole  story  shows  it  most  plainly.  i\nd 
we  understand  why  it  was  not  recorded  more  plainly 
when  we  read  in  Nehemiah  the  written  ultimatum  of 
Sanballet,  charging  that  the  prophets  are  saying  that 
there  is  a  king  in  Jerusalem,  and  threatening  to  report 
this  fact  to  the  king  of  Persia.  It  was  not  safe  to  write 
down  in  black  and  white  that  the  prophets  had  crowned 
a  king;  for  their  city  and  king  and  temple  were  all  in 
danger  as  it  was,  and  they  were  surrounded  by  enemies, 
eager  to  report  to  Darius  that  they  had  set  up  a  throne 
in  Jerusalem  and  were  planning  for  political  independ- 
ence. So  they  do  not  tell  us  that  they  actually  crowned 
a  king;  but  they  tell  us  that  they  made  two  crowns,  and 
that  they  crowned  the  high  priest.  Then  they  tell  us 
in  the  same  breath  who  the  other  man  was,  beside  whom 
on  the  throne  the  high  priest  was  to  sit,  with  the  re- 
sponsibilities of  church  and  state  divided  between  them 

—3— 


WHO      WORE      THE      OTHER      CROWN? 

both.  And  they  hailed  that  other  man  by  the  Messianic 
name,  The  Branch  of  Jehovah,  and  they  laid  up  his 
crown  in  the  temple  till  the  day  should  come  when  he 
could  wear  it  publicly. 

They  do  not  stop  with  this.  They  actually  tell  us  the 
name  of  the  man  who  was  crowned  in  Jerusalem.  They 
tell  us  his  name,  and  his  descent  from  David.  He  was 
the  grandson  of  Jehoiachin,  the  young  king  who  reigned 
only  three  months  in  Jerusalem  before  he  was  carried 
into  exile,  and  who  died  in  Babylon.  It  was  his  grand- 
son who  was  crowned  in  Jerusalem  seventy  years  after- 
ward, and  his  name  was  Zerubbabel. 

Let  me  tell  you  the  story  of  that  coronation,  for  it  is 
one  of  the  most  interesting  in  the  secret  history  of  any 
kingdom. 

Jerusalem  was  destroyed  in  586  B.  C.  Its  last  king 
was  Zedekiah,  and  he  and  his  sons  were  killed  by  Neb- 
uchadnezzar when  the  city  fell.  But  there  was  a  young 
man  living  in  Babylon  who  had  been  king  for  three 
months,  a  man  beloved  by  the  Prophet  Ezekiel,  a  man 
for  whom  the  nation  mourned  and  prayed;  a  man  con- 
cerning whom  hymns  were  sung,  and  petitions  offered 
to  God  that  before  the  seventy  years  of  exile  were  over, 
Jehoiachin  might  return  to  Jerusalem  and  rebuild  the 
throne  of  his  father  David.  Jehoiachin  died  in  Babylon, 
but  he  rose  to  a  position  of  honor  in  the  later  years  of  his 
life,  and  his  sons  were  men  of  distinction.  When  the 
first  return  from  exile  occurred  in  537,  Zerubbabel  assist- 
ed his  uncle,  who  was  the  leader  of  it.  Ezra  gives  us  the 
official  roster  of  the  families  that  returned,  and  the  first 
name  is  Zerubbabel  the  prince,  and  the  second  is  Joshua 
the  high  priest.  (Ezra  2:1-2.)  Joshua  was  the  grandson 
of  the  last  priest  in  Jerusalem,  Seriah,  whom  Nebuchad- 
nezzar put  to  death.    Zerubbabel  was  the  grandson  of  the 


WHO       WORE      THE       OTHER       CROWN? 

last  living  king  who  had  sat  on  the  throne  of  David. 
And  on  the  death  of  his  uncle  he  became  governor  in 
Jerusalem,  acting  under  the  authority  of  the  king  of 
Persia. 

Immediately  on  the  return  of  these  exiles,  they  re- 
built the  altar  of  Jehovah  on  its  original  site,  which  old 
men  among  them  were  able  to  identify,  and  they  appear 
to  have  laid  a  part  of  the  foundation  of  the  temple;  but 
there  the  work  stopped,  and  it  was  seventeen  years  be- 
fore it  began  again.  There  was  a  reason  for  this.  The 
Samaritan  neighbors  were  suspicious,  and  Cyrus,  dis- 
turbed by  their  reports,  hindered  the  work  from  going 
forward. 

After  a  delay  of  seventeen  years,  Darius  came  to  the 
throne,  and  Zerubbabel  received  an  appointment  as  gov- 
ernor. The  prophets  hurried  to  urge  him  to  resume  work 
on  the  temple.  They  were  eager  not  only  to  begin  it, 
but  to  rush  it,  before  any  orders  could  reach  them  from 
Persia  forbidding  it. 

An  aged  prophet  and  a  young  one  joined  in  urging 
this  work.  Zerubbabel  had  built  himself  a  good  house, 
equipped  with  all  modern  improvements,  but  the  work  on 
the  temple  had  not  been  touched  for  seventeen  years. 
Haggai,  an  aged  prophet,  preached  a  sermon  on  the  ist 
of  September,  520  B.  C,  urging  the  work  and  that  it  be 
hastened.  It  took  twenty-four  days  to  get  the  governor 
and  the  people  committed  to  the  plan,  and  that  seemed 
a  long  time  to  the  preacher ;  but  on  the  24th  day  of  the 
month,  they  laid  the  corner  stone.  They  rushed  the  con- 
tract. On  the  21  St  day  of  October  interest  seemed  to  be 
flagging,  and  the  people  were  saying  that  this  could 
never  be  a  very  great  temple  anyway,  as  compared  with 
the  old  one;  and  then  the  same  prophet  preached  another 
sermon,    addressed    directly    to    the    governor,    saying, 

—5— 


WHO      WORE      THE      OTHER      CROWN? 

"Courage,  Zerubbabel  1  God  will  help  you  through,  and 
the  money  will  come !"  Two  months  later,  on  the  24th 
of  December,  Haggai  preached  twice,  and  still  urged  on 
the  building.  In  that  sermon  he  answered  the  people 
who  were  feeling  the  financial  burden.  He  told  them 
that  they  must  not  expect  results  too  soon,  but  he  said 
that  when  the  temple  was  finished,  God  would  take  Ze- 
rubbabel and  make  him  a  representative  of  divine  power, 
shaking  the  heavens,  and  overthrowing  kingdoms.  He 
said,  "In  that  day,  saith  Jehovah,  will  I  take  thee,  O  Ze- 
rubbabel, and  I  will  make  thee  as  a  signet;  for  I  have 
chosen  thee,  O  Zerubbabel."  (Haggai  2:23.)  A  signet 
ring  was  that  with  which  a  king  was  accustomed  to  sign 
his  name.  God  was  to  make  Zerubbabel  his  power  of 
attorney.     It  was  a  large  thing  to  promise. 

On  the  day  that  Haggai  made  this  promise,  they  laid 
the  corner  stone  upon  the  foundation.  The  work  had 
made  so  much  of  progress  in  three  months;  and  this 
quotation  is  part  of  the  sermon  which  Haggai  preached 
at  the  second  service  on  that  winter  Sabbath,  December 
24,  in  the  year  520  B.  C. 

Did  Haggai  promise  too  much?  The  young  prophet 
Zechariah  promised  more.  He  outlined  the  plan  of  gov- 
ernment under  the  new  regime.  Zerubbabel  and  Joshua, 
representing  State  and  Church,  were  to  have  a  co-ordin- 
ate rulership,  Zerubbabel  was  to  be  ruler  of  the  land, 
but  the  land  was  to  be  governed  by  Jehovah,  and  the 
high  priest  was  to  have  a  place  close  to  Zerubbabel  upon 
the  throne. 

On  March  3,  515,  after  four  and  one-half  years  of  in- 
cessant labor,  the  temple  was  completed.  Haggai  did  not 
live  to  see  it,  but  Zechariah  continued  to  preach  in  Jerus- 
alem until  after  the  temple  was  finished,  and  he  must 


WHO       WORE      THE      OTHER      CROWN? 

have  had  many  things  to  contend  with  during  that  long 
period. 

It  was  while  this  work  was  under  way  that  there 
came  to  Jerusalem  a  committee  of  four  men  from  Baby- 
lon, where  very  many  rich  and  pious  Jews  were  living. 
These  four  men  are  named  in  the  text.  They  brought 
with  them  a  contribution  of  money,  and  also  brought 
good  news  concerning  affairs  of  government  in  Persia. 
Darius  was  having  troubles  of  his  own,  and  was  not  like- 
ly to  interfere  with  the  temple.  The  old  records  had 
been  searched,  and  the  original  decree  of  Cyrus  had  been 
found,  and  the  work  was  to  be  permitted  to  go  on.  Per- 
sian politics  were  in  more  or  less  confusion,  so  that  the 
Jews,  if  they  proceeded  with  caution,  might  hope  to  re- 
gain their  independence. 

This  was  good  news,  and  Zechariah  was  anxious  to 
have  some  kind  of  meeting  while  the  committee  was  in 
Jerusalem  which  they  could  report  quietly  to  their  friends 
in  Babylon  that  would  assure  them  that  matters  were  go- 
ing forward  in  Jerusalem.  In  a  vision  he  saw  it  all,  and 
he  carried  it  out.  A  little  company  gathered  in  a  room 
of  the  uncompleted  temple.  The  four  men  from  Babylon 
were  there,  and  doubtless  a  few  leading  citizens  in  Jerus- 
alem, but  no  one  was  invited  who  could  not  be  trusted. 
The  prophet  had  come  prepared,  for  he  had  caused  two 
crowns  to  be  made.  And  while  they  were  all  gathered  in 
secrecy,  and  doubtless  at  night,  and  Joshua  and  Zerub- 
babel  were  there  in  the  midst,  the  prophet  laid  one  crown 
upon  the  head  of  the  high  priest.  What  he  did  with  the 
other  he  never  wrote  down  in  black  and  white,  but  this  is 
what  he  said,  as  he  stood  beside  Zerubbabel  with  the 
other  crown,  "Behold  the  man  whose  name  is  the  Branch ; 

—7— 


WHO      WORE      THE      OTHER      CROWN? 

he  shall  build  the  temple  of  Jehovah,  and  he  shall  sit  upon 
his  throne."* 

All  this  is  a  matter  of  record.  And  knowing  this,  you 
are  at  liberty  to  guess  for  yourself  what  the  prophet  did 
with  the  other  crown. 

I,  too,  will  guess.  And  my  guess  is  that  when  the 
prophet  uttered  those  words,  in  the  hush  of  a  solemn 
silence  that  attended  that  secret  gathering,  he  laid  the 
crown  on  no  other  head  than  that  of  Zerubbabel,  the  de- 
scendant of  David.  And  then,  the  lights  were  hurriedly 
put  out,  and  the  little  company  dispersed,  but  they  laid 
up  that  crown  in  the  temple,  as  the  emblem  of  their  great 
and  secret  hope. 

So  then  it  is  no  Avonder  that  the  Samaritans  heard 
whispers  of  it,  and  that  in  time  Sanballet  sent  to  Jerusa- 
lem, and  threatened  to  tell  the  king  of  Persia  that  they 
had  secretly  crowned  a  king  in  Jerusalem. 

But  the  Samaritans  never  could  prove  their  charge. 
The  secret  was  well  kept.  You  and  I  are  among  the  few 
who  really  have  discovered  just  what  was  done  that  night 
in  Jerusalem.  We  are  of  the  select  and  trustworthy  few 
who  know  who  wore  the  other  crown. 

What  became  of  that  king,  to  whom  the  prophets 

*  George  Adam  Smith,  and  some  other  scholars,  hold  that 
there  was  but  one  crown,  and  that  the  plural  form  is  used  be- 
cause the  crown  contained  two  or  more  circlets;  but  this 
learned  author  is  emphatic  in  his  declaration  that  the  one  crown 
was  worn  by  the  civil,  not  the  ecclesiastical,  ruler.  "The  pres- 
ent text  assigns  this  crown  to  Joshua,  the  high  priest;  but  as 
we  have  remarked,  and  will  presently  prove  in  the  notes  on 
the  translation,  the  original  text  assigned  it  to  Zerubbabel,  the 
civil  head  of  the  community,  and  gave  Joshua  a  place  at  his 
right  hand,  the  two  to  act  in  perfect  accord  with  each  other." 
(Minor  Prophets,  ii,  308.) 

Most  scholars,  however,  hold  the  plural  form  indicates 
two  crowns;  but  if  there  was  but  one,  the  important  corona- 
tion was  that  of  the  civil  ruler.  See  Cornill's  "Prophets  of 
Israel,"  p.  153,  4. 


WHO      WORE      THE      OTHER      CROWN? 

preached  so  many  sermons,  and  on  whom  the  people  hung 
such  high  hopes?  Did  he  fulfill  the  hopes  of  those  who 
tried  to  see  in  him  a  successor  of  David?  We  have  all 
too  good  reason  to  fear  that  he  was  a  disappointment  to 
his  friends. 

Zerubbabel  had  a  noble  ancestry.  He  had  favor  with 
the  king  of  Persia.  He  had  the  support  and  advice  of 
prophets  well  suited  to  their  time,  prophets  who  were 
not  men  of  lofty  idealism,  but  who  had  a  genius  for  prac- 
tical achievement.  He  had  sympathy  and  financial  sup- 
port from  Babylon.  He  had  the  inspiration  of  men  whose 
great  hopes  were  founded  on  acquaintances  with  his 
grandfather,  possibly  even  his  great-grandfather  Josiah, 
and  who  held  before  him  constant  incentives  to  the  best 
of  which  he  was  capable. 

Few  men  have  had  so  many  good  sermons  preached 
straight  at  them  as  Zerubbabel.  The  prophets  were  al- 
ways reminding  him  that  he  had  begun  this  great  work, 
and  that  he  alone  could  finish  it.  They  were  forever  say- 
ing, "Have  courage,  O  Zerubbabel.  What  if  there  are 
obstacles?  Before  Zerubbabel  the  mountain  shall  become 
a  plain!  What  if  the  money  does  come  slowly?  The  sil^ 
ver  and  the  gold  belong  to  God,  and  Zerubbabel  is  God's 
anointed.  You  are  a  great  man,  Zerubbabel !  You  are  a 
king's  son,  Zerubbabel !  Zerubbabel  began  this  work, 
and  Zerubbabel  shall  finish  it !  Zerubbabel  is  no  quitter ! 
He  is  a  son  of  David !" 

And  so  by  praises  that  were  half  censures,  and  by 
promises  almost  extravagant,  they  finally  nerved  Zerub- 
babel to  go  on  with  the  work.  But  every  time  a  new 
thing  is  undertaken,  you  hear  the  voice  of  the  prophet, 
trying  to  force  a  little  enthusiasm  into  Zerubbabel. 

I  think  I  can  imagine  just  how  Zerubbabel  acted  when 
the  prophets  talked  this  way  to  him.     He  resented  it  a 

—9— 


WHO   WORE   THE   OTHER   CROWN? 

little  that  they  should  forever  tell  him  what  he  ought  to 
do ;  but  it  pleased  his  vanity,  also.  It  made  him  the  central 
figure  in  several  important  functions.  It  kept  his  name 
well  in  the  head-lines,  and  enabled  him  to  think  highly  of 
himself.  After  each  prophetic  admonition,  he  straight- 
ened himself  up,  and  lighted  another  cigarette,  and  re- 
membered for  several  hours  how  great  a  man  he  was. 
Meantime  the  prophets  were  ordering  another  consign- 
men  of  building  material,  and  pushing  the  work  as  hard 
as  they  could  while  Zerubbabel  was  in  the  mood  to  sign 
their  requisitions. 

I  do  not  want  to  blame  Zerubabbel  for  not  accomplish- 
ing the  impossible.  I  am  not  sure  that  any  man  in  his 
position  could  have  made  Judah  independent  at  that  time, 
I  am  not  sure  but  that  the  crown  laid  up  in  the  temple 
would  have  tarnished  before  it  was  placed  for  a  second 
time  on  the  head  of  any  other  son  of  David.  It  may  be 
that  he  did  as  well  as  could  have  been  expected  in  being 
the  mere  figure-head  of  a  movement  which  the  prophets 
were  able  to  force  through  under  the  harmless  little  fic- 
tion of  his  leadership.  We  do  not  know  the  circum- 
stances well  enough  to  judge  him  severely.  We  have  the 
vision  of  a  moment's  lantern  flash  upon  that  solemn  scene 
of  coronation,  permitting  us  to  share  with  the  prophets 
this  old  time  secret;  and  then  we  hear  the  two  prophets, 
the  young  one  and  the  old  one,  preaching  about  once  a 
month  in  their  heroic  endeavor  to  strengthen  the  waver- 
ing purpose  of  a  king  whose  chief  distinction  was  that  he 
was  the  grandson  of  his  grandfather.  We  hear  them  dis- 
tinctly hammering  him  with  the  declaration  that  God  had 
said  that  Zerubbabel's  hands  had  laid  the  foundation  of 
this  house,  and  that  Zerubbabel  should  finish  it.  Appar- 
ently they  risked  something  in  that  prophecy,  but  they 
saw  it  fulfilled.     But  of  those  larger  hopes  which  they 

—10— 


WHO       WORE      THE      OTHER      CROWN? 

cherished,  and  which  found  whispered  but  exultant  ex- 
pression on  that  night  when  the  golden  circlet  in  the 
hands  of  the  prophet  rested  for  a  sweet  and  hazardous 
moment  on  the  head  of  Zerubbabel,  of  those  great  hopes, 
alas  we  only  know  that  they  died  with  Zerubbabel. 

It  was  long  years  afterward  when  the  hope  of  a  king 
revived  in  Jerusalem ;  and  when  the  Maccabean  revolt  set 
the  blood  of  Israel  leaping  with  hope  of  another  king, 
no  one  remembered  that  a  king  to  sit  upon  that  throne 
must  be  a  son  of  David. 

Zerubbabel  is  the  man  who  enjoys  this  doubtful  hon- 
or— with  him  died  the  hope  of  having  a  son  of  David  to 
sit  on  the  throne  in  Jerusalem.  Whatever  he  might  have 
done  and  did  not  do,  this  at  least  he  did  for  which  it  is 
hard  to  forgive  him — he  let  the  hope  die  out  of  having  a 
son  of  David  to  sit  upon  his  throne. 

He  returned  to  Jerusalem  with  the  dew  of  his  youth 
still  upon  him,  and  his  name  was  foremost  among  those 
to  whom  the  sacred  task  was  given,  of  rebuilding  the 
temple  of  God.  And  round  him  gathered  such  hopes  as 
seldom  have  centered  about  one  human  life ;  and  the  peo- 
ple, poring  over  the  pages  of  the  prophets,  gave  him  the 
holy  name  which  Isaiah  and  Jeremiah  had  chosen  to  de- 
scribe the  Messiah  of  God.  But  he  settled  down  in  his 
comfortable  house,  and  though  the  prophets  now  and 
then  roused  his  flagging  zeal,  and  managed  to  get  the 
temple  built,  it  was  the  last  thing  they  ever  got  out  of 
Zerubbabel.  He  vanished  into  insignificant  obscurity.  Re- 
member it  once  more,  this  son  of  splendid  promise  and  of 
magnificent  heritage  and  opportunity  was  the  man  with 
whom  the  hope  died  out  of  having  a  son  of  David  on  the 
throne  in  Jerusalem. 

Zerubbabel  was  the  man  who  failed  to  fulfill  prophecy. 
While  in  the  larger  sense  every  prophetic  message  had  its 

—11— 


WHO      WORE      THE      OTHER      CROWN? 

fulfillment,  and  those  concerning  the  completion  of  the 
temple  in  Zerubbabel's  day  were  all  fulfilled,  thanks  to 
the  zeal  of  the  prophets,  none  of  those  splendid  hopes 
came  to  pass  that  were  cherished  on  that  night  when 
Zerubbabel  knelt  at  the  feet  of  the  prophet,  and  the  light 
of  the  torches  flashed  on  a  new  golden  crown,  resting  on 
the  head  of  a  son  of  David,  in  the  old  city  which  his 
fathers  had  made  great.  Zerubbabel  was  the  man  who 
failed  to  make  good ;  the  man  with  whom  the  hope  of  his 
nation  died. 

Zerubbabel  was  a  young  man  when  all  this  began. 
The  hope  of  youth  was  upon  him  when  he  first  was 
made  nominal  leader  of  the  return  from  exile.  It  was 
given  to  him  while  still  a  young  man  to  stand  at  the  head 
of  the  most  notable  movement  of  his  generation,  and  to 
surround  himself  with  the  halo  of  prophetic  hope  that 
had  inspired  his  nation  through  the  long  days  of  exile. 
Men  who  themselves  were  to  die  in  Babylon  looked  to 
him  to  bring  to  their  children  the  blessings  which  the 
prophets  had  declared  were  to  come  through  a  son  of 
David.  But  after  one  brilliant  achievement,  led  by  other 
men  under  the  auspices  of  his  almost  royal  name,  he 
shrank  from  public  view,  and  died  obscure  and  without 
influence.  So  died  a  man  whose  life  at  one  time  promised 
so  much  that  a  prophet  of  God  made  a  crown  of  gold  and 
laid  it  on  his  head.  Bunyan  tells  us  of  the  man  with  the 
muck-rake  who  never  saw  the  crown  of  gold  which  the 
angel  held  above  his  head;  but  Zerubbabel  saw  it,  felt 
the  thrill  of  it  as  it  touched  his  hair,  knelt  in  reverent 
awe  and  listened  to  the  prophetic  word,  "Thus  speaketh 
Jehovah  of  hosts,  saying,  Behold  the  man  whose  name  is 
the  Branch.  Even  he  shall  build  the  temple  of  Jehovah, 
and  he  shall  bear  the  glory,  and  he  shall  sit  and  rule  upon 
his  throne."    Zerubbabel  heard  all  this,  and  felt  the  hope 

—12— 


WHO      WORE      THE      OTHER      CROWN? 

and  ambition  of  it  for  an  hour;  dreamed  of  it  that  night, 
and  forgot  it  next  day;  and  his  kingdom  never  came  to 
him. 

When  five  hundred  years  afterward  there  came  to  Je- 
rusalem another  Son  of  David,  the  crown  has  long  since 
disappeared,  and  the  only  crown  reserved  for  Jesus,  the 
son  of  David,  was  one  of  thorns.  He  came  with  no  au- 
thority from  human  government,  no  power  or  prestige 
such  as  Zerubbabel  had,  but  he  founded  a  kingdom  that 
more  than  fulfilled  all  the  prophetic  hopes,  and  inspired 
the  world  with  faith  in  a  kingdom  that  shall  endure  for- 
ever. 

I  have  cliosen  this  lesson  from  the  almost  forgotten 
history  of  the  Bible  because  it  teaches  its  own  lesson 
to  young  men  and  women  of  today.  As  the  prophets 
preached  their  messages  straight  at  Zerubbabel,  so  let  me 
preach  as  directly  as  I  may  to  the  young  men  and  women 
of  this  congregation. 

There  is  no  man  so  unworthy  as  he  who  wilfully  dis- 
appoints great  and  reasonable  hopes.  When  Dr.  Cook 
returned  from  the  northland,  he  stood  before  kings,  and 
received  garlands  hung  about  his  neck  by  royal  hands. 
And  when  his  story  was  attacked  by  a  churlish,  though 
honest  rival,  the  world  was  disposed  to  believe  in  Cook, 
and  cherished  great  hopes  that  he  would  prove  himself 
worthy  of  their  confidence.  Today  his  story  is  discred- 
ited by  the  Danish  nation  that  welcomed  him  with  glad 
acclaim,  and  by  the  nation  whose  flag  he  has  disgraced 
with  a  contemptible  lie.  For  if  he  has  lied,  he  has  lied 
as  no  other  man  ever  lied.  He  has  lied  to  the  whole 
world,  and  that  from  the  meanest  of  motives,  a  desire  for 
wealth  and  honor,  stolen  from  another  man  who  had 

—13— 


WHO       WORE      THE      OTHER      CROWN? 

faced  death  to  win  it,  and  who  rightly  deserved  it.  We 
hoped  he  was  honest.  We  believed  in  him.  We  wanted 
him  to  make  good.  And  now  it  is  well  that  he  hides  his 
dishonored  head.  There  is  no  spot  on  earth  where  the 
man  who  has  been  guilty  of  such  a  fraud,  who  has  be- 
trayed such  confidence  and  hope,  can  live  in  the  esteem 
and  confidence  of  his  fellow  men.  He  is  a  man  without 
a  countrv.  And  yet  it  is  but  a  few  days  since  he  sat,  all 
garlanded  and  decorated,  and  was  the  guest  of  honor  of 
a  king. 

The  garlands  that  hung  about  the  neck  of  Dr.  Cook 
have  withered,  and  another  man  wears  the  crown  which 
the  people  had  laid  up  for  him.  He  has  deceived  the  con- 
fidence and  blasted  the  hopes  of  those  who  trusted  him ; 
and  there  are  few  things  that  a  man  can  do  that  are  worse 
than  that. 

You  cannot  know  how  many  are  the  hopes  that  gather 
round  you.  Only  dimly  do  you  guess  how  large  are  the 
expectations  of  your  family  and  friends  on  your  behalf. 
Many  of  you  are  in  college,  having  been  sent  there  as 
Zerubbabel  was  sent  from  Babylon,  by  those  who  could 
not  go  themselves.  All  the  unfilled  hopes  of  your  fathers 
and  mothers  for  their  own  lives  gather  about  you.  You 
have  been  sent  on  that  you  may  build  a  temple  of  strong 
manhood  or  glorious  womanhood;  and  there  have  not 
been  lacking  frequent  embassies  from  home,  like  those 
of  Helem  and  Tobijah  and  Jedaiah  and  Hen,  bearing 
frequent  remittances,  and  desiring  information  of  the 
progress  of  the  work.  Every  one  of  you  is  a  Zerubbabel, 
a  child  of  honored  family  and  of  self-denying  faith.  And 
all  the  hopes  of  all  your  friends  rest  as  a  crown  upon 
you  in  your  welcome  home  at  this  holiday  season. 

Shall  these  hopes  die  with  you?  Shall  you  be  content 
with  anything  less  than  the  best  of  which  you  are  capa- 

—14— 


WHO   WORE   THE   OTHER   CROWN? 

ble?  "Beloved,  we  are  persuaded  better  things  of  you, 
and  things  which  accompany  salvation,  though  we  thus 
speak." 

The  crown  of  Zerubbabel  was  laid  up  in  the  temple 
till  some  marauding  hand  stole  and  pawned  it,  or  some 
rascally  priest  sold  it  to  a  relic-hunter.  There  is  no  hope 
of  your  finding  it.  But  there  is  a  crown  for  every  one  of 
you  laid  up  in  a  place  more  sure.  "Henceforth  there  is 
laid  up  for  me  a  crown  of  righteousness,  which  the  Lord, 
the  righteous  judge  shall  give  me  at  that  day,  and  not  to 
me  only,  but  also  to  all  them  that  have  loved  His 
appearing.'' 

And  so  my  closing  admonition  is  no  other  than  that 
of  the  beloved  disciple,  who  wrote  from  Patmos  to  the 
young  people  to  whom  he  could  not  preach  every  Sunday, 
"Hold  fast  that  which  thou  hast,  that  no  man  take  thy 
crown."      (Rev.  3:11.) 

We  admonish  you  in  confidence  and  in  love.  We  con- 
gratulate you  on  what  you  have  accomplished.  And  we 
say  as  the  prophet  said  of  old,  "Be  strong,  O  Zerubbabel, 
and  complete  the  good  work  which  you  have  begun.  You 
have  laid  the  foundations  of  noble  character,  and  we  are 
sure  you  will  complete  it.  All  the  love  of  home  and  the 
expectations  of  friends  are  yours ;  and  your's  shall  be  the 
crown  of  useful  lives,  and  the  favor  of  Almighty  God. 
Let  no  man  take  thy  crown." 


THE   FIVE  POINTS 

Just  a  year  ago,  in  a  sermon  addressed     to     young 
people.  Dr.  Barton  outlined  the  "five  points"  of  a  work- 
ing system  of  belief.     These  five  points  have  often  been 
I    asked  for,  and  here  are  printed  by  request . 

—15— 


WHO      WORE      THE      OTHER      CROWN? 

You  are  lamenting,  or  perhaps  rejoicing,  in  the  passing 
of  the  old-time  creeds.  You  are  saying  that  you  have  no 
material  out  of  which  to  fashion  a  creed ;  and  you  speak 
slightingly,  or  perhaps  with  sorrow,  of  the  creeds  that 
have  disappeared. 

None  of  the  great  truths  have  disappeared.  They 
are  all  with  us,  and  ever  will  be.  I  will  not  undertake 
to  make  a  creed  for  you;  every  man  must  do  that  for 
himself.  But  I  will  show  you,  for  I  think  I  can,  how 
much  material  you  have  on  hand  for  the  making  of  a 
perfectly  good  creed  of  your  own,  as  good  as  ever  was 
€xpressed  in  the  Five  Points  of  Calvinism.  And  this, 
the  guiding  star  of  your  faith,  shall  have  five  points,  also : 

1.  If  you  believe  that  this  universe  is  to  be  interpreted  as 
intention,  that  the  Power  behind  and  working  through  it  is 
Intelligence  and  Will,  and  not  blind  Fate,  you  believe  in  the 
Personality   of   God. 

2.  If  you  believe  that  the  God  who  made  you  and  other  men 
with  consciences,  such  that  they  must  approve  the  right  and 
condemn  the  wrong,  even  when  they  themselves  do  wrong, 
must  Himself  be  good,  you  then  believe  that  Righteousness 
is  the  bed-rock  of  the  moral  universe,  that  is  to  say,  you  believe 
that  God  is  Good. 

3.  If  you  believe  that  Jesus  shows  us  not  only  how  men 
ought  to  live,  but  also  what  is  the  essential  character  of  God, 
so  that  you  can  say,  "God  is  the  kind  God  whose  human 
manifestation  we  discover  in  Jesus  of  Nazareth,"  then,  what- 
ever your  metaphysical  difficulties,  you  believe  both  in  the 
humanity  and  in  the  divinity  of  Jesus  the  Christ. 

4.  If  you  believe  that  among  all  the  books  of  the  world, 
the  Bible,  with  its  progressive  revelation,  shows  to  us  in  the 
consummation  of  that  revelation,  or  if  you  prefer  to  say  so,  in 
its  best  teaching,  the  most  exalted  idea  of  God,  and  the  noblest 
conception  of  human  duty,  then,  no  matter  what  your  difficulties 
about  the  authorship  of  this  book  and  the  date  of  that,  you 
believe  in  the  inspiration  of  the   Bible. 

5.  If  you  are  willing  to  act  upon  this  faith,  and  follow 
Jesus  as  your  Master,  doing  God's  will  so  far  as  you  know  it, 
in  a  spirit  of  loving  obedience,  then  you  are  a  Christian. 

Moreover,  you  have  a  faith  which  cannot  be  shaken  by 
any  discovery  of  science  or  of  Biblical  Criticism.  And  it  is 
right  and  fitting  that  you  should  join  with  others  like-minded 
in  the  fellowship  of  the  Christian  Church. 

—16— 


(Bm  Eeasionalile  ^erbice 


I  beseech  you,  therefore,  brethren,  by  the  mercies  of  God, 
that  ye  present  your  bodies,  a  living  sacrifice,  holy,  acceptable 
unto  God,  which  is  your  reasonable  service.     Romans  12:1. 


It  is  only  in  recent  years  that  we  may  be  said  to 
have  begun  a  study  of  the  sacrifices  of  the  Jewish  people 
as  related  to  the  history  contained  in  the  Bible.  We  are 
much  indebted  to  those  faithful  and  much  misunderstood 
students  of  the  Word  of  God,  who  have  brought  new 
light  to  us  in  this  particular.  Formerly  it  seemed  as 
though  there  were  a  hopeless  contradiction  between  the 
books  which  contain  directions  concerning  sacrifice  and 
the  historical  books  in  which  accounts  of  various  sac- 
rifices appear.  Deuteronomy,  and  still  more  Leviticus, 
describe  to  us  minutely  the  ways  in  which  sacrifices  are 
to  be  ofifered;  and  when  we  read  the  books  of  Samuel 
and  Kings  we  do  not  find  them  offered  in  that  way,  but 
in  ways  very  different  from  those  prescribed. 

For  instance,  when  Samuel  and  Saul  first  meet,  the 
prophet  blesses  the  sacrifice,  and  he  and  the  people  sit 
down  and  eat  it  together.  When  the  ark  returns  from  the 
land  of  the  Philistines,  no  priest  is  sent  for,  but  the  men 
laboring  in  the  field  prepare  the  sacrifice,  in  very  different 
manner  from  that  which  Leviticus  directs.  Israel  ap- 
pears to  have  spent  most  of  its  national  life  without 
knowing  of  these  elaborate   sacrificial   laws. 

This  great  gulf  fixed  between  law  and  life,  between 
the  directions  in  the  books  of  law  and  the  record  of 
the  books  of  history,  was  most  perplexing.  The  only 
reasonable  explanation  that  has  been  offered  has  not  met 
with  favor  everywhere.  Our  friends  who  are  known  as 
the  higher  critics  have  given  us  what  I  believe  is  the 
true  explanation.     They  have  called  our  attention  to  the 

—17— 


OUR     REASONABLE      SERVICE 

simplicity  of  the  forms  of  sacrifice  in  that  first  little 
book  of  laws  which  is  called  "The  Covenant  Code,"  con- 
taining a  brief  section  of  the  Book  of  Exodus,  beginning 
with  the  Ten  Commandments.  This,  they  say  to  us, 
is  a  complete  code  of  laws,  a  criminal  code,  a  civil  code, 
and  a  sacrificial  code  as  well ;  and  it  was  the  original 
law  book  of  the  Hebrew  people.  All  the  laws  which 
the  Jewish  people  had  concerning  sacrifice  while  they  were 
journeying  through  the  wilderness  and  living  their  early 
life  in  Palestine  were  these  contained  in  this  little  book. 
But  later,  after  Jerusalem  became  the  capital,  and  there 
was  a  temple  and  a  priesthood,  the  ritual  grew  more 
elaborate,  and  continued  its  elaboration  to  a  very  late 
period ;  and  more  than  once  the  law  book  underwent 
revision,  largely  by  way  of  addition.  And  the  priests, 
when  they  incorporated  into  that  book  the  ritual  of 
Deuteronomy,  and  still  later  the  yet  more  elaborate 
provisions  of  Leviticus,  did  not  date  their  revisions,  nor 
think  it  necessary  to  explain  that  this  had  been  added 
since  the  time  of  Moses.  They  believed  themselves  still 
to  be  carrying  out,  in  that  more  elaborate  program,  the 
spirit  of  the  Mosaic  legislation. 

Now,  I  am  convinced  that  this  explanation,  how- 
ever much  it  may  lack  in  its  incidentals,  is  correct  as 
to  method,  and  true  in  its  essential  conclusions.  I 
believe  that  sacrifice,  as  the  Hebrews  first  knew  it,  and 
as  we  find  it  celebrated  in  the  earlier  books  of  the  Bible, 
was  a  simple,  and  often  a  family  matter,  a  feast,  and 
often  one  of  joy,  rather  than  of  confession  of  sin,  but 
that  it  grew  more  elaborate  in  accordance  with  the 
development  of  a  movement  which  we  are  coming  better 
to  understand. 

It  is  in  the  light  of  such  knowledge  as  this  that  we 

—18— 


OUR     REASONABLE     SERVICE 

are  able  to  interpret  the  attitude  of  the  prophets  toward 
the  sacrifices  of  their  time.  We  can  understand  how 
Isaiah  declared  to  the  people  that  God  had  not  required 
this  at  their  hands ;  that  He  was  weary  of  the  fat  of 
lambs,  and  had  no  delight  in  the  blood  of  animals 
(Isaiah  1:11-12).  We  can  understand  how  Amos  dared 
to  say  that  God  hated  these  meat  offerings,  and  would 
not  accept  them  (Amos  5:21-22),  We  can  understand, 
what  seemed  to  us  very  strange  before,  how  Jeremiah 
boldly  challenged  the  whole  system  as  an  innovation, 
and  declared  that  God  had  not  taught  it  to  the  nation 
when  it  came  out  of  Egypt  (Jeremiah  7:21-23).  We 
understand  the  bold  utterances  of  the  psalms  that  God 
desireth  not  sacrifice. 

Not  only  so  but  we  understand  the  attitude  of  Jesus 
on  this  subject,  for  Christ  was  a  higher  critic;  and 
declared  that  circumcision  was  "not  of  Moses  but  of 
the  fathers,"  that  is,  a  rite  in  which  the  original  law  of 
Moses  had  been  overlaid  with  tradition  till  it  was  no 
longer  his. 

And  we  are  better  able  to  understand  the  attitude  of 
Paul,  and  of  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews,  in  which  these 
sacrifices  are  declared  to  have  been  weak  and  unprofitable 
and  temporary. 

But  if  all  this  is  true,  why  did  not  God  repudiate 
them?  Why  did  He  permit  their  incorporation  into  a 
system  of  worship  which  came  to  be  characterized  as 
his  own? 

For  this  reason,  as  I  suppose,  that,  imperfect  as  they 
were,  hateful  to  Him  as  the}^  were  in  their  bloodshed 
and  hollowness,  they  did  make  real  to  a  primitive  people 
a  mighty  principle  which  must  underlie  all  real  worship. 
Sacrifices  are  temporary,  but  sacrifice  is  eternal. 

So  when  Jesus  came  to  earth,  the  thing  which  He 
—19— 


OUR     REASONABLE     SERVICE 

undertook  to  make  real  above  all  others  was  this,  that 
the  heart  of  God  is  a  heart  of  eternal  sacrifice.  The 
crucifixion  of  Jesus,  and  His  death  for  sin,  do  not  con- 
stitute the  final  fact.  Calvary  is  overtopped  by  Olivet. 
The  stone  at  the  door  of  the  tomb  is  not  the  finis  of  faith, 
but  the  light  breaking  forth,  that  never  can  be  dimmed, 
streaming  from  the  place  where  Jesus  rose  from  the 
dead.  And  yet  the  cross  is  the  emblem  of  our  faith, 
because  it  testifies  to  the  sacrificial  love  of  God,  and 
appeals  to  the  sacrificial  heart  of  the  world. 

In  the  year  2010,  some  student  of  church  history  will 
be  seeking  to  explain  why  Christian  Science  did  not 
continue  to  grow  and  possess  the  land.  He  will  see 
that  it  started  with  considerable  promise  and  that  it 
grew  for  a  time  with  quite  surprising  rapidity,  and  he 
will  wonder  why  it  did  not  continue  to  grow  until  it  was 
accepted  as  the  authoritative  interpretation  of  Chris- 
tianity. I  can  think  of  four  reasons  that  he  will  be 
likely  to  give,  and  three  of  them  I  will  not  take  time 
now  to  tell.  But  one  of  the  reasons  I  am  confident  will 
be  that  Christian  Science  has  no  logical  place  for  sacri- 
fice. To  alleviate  the  suflferings  of  the  world  by  denying 
them,  to  seek  for  one's  own  self-healing  of  body  or  peace 
of  soul,  and  with  that  to  be  content,  is  not  to  possess 
the  world,  nor  to  conquer  it.  Sacrifice  is  a  fundamental 
law  of  life,  and  no  religion  can  permanently  survive  that 
denies  the  fundamental  facts  of  life. 

Yet  the  Bible  does  not  teach  sacrifice  for  the  sake 
of  sacrifice.  It  does  not  teach  us  that  pain  is  desirable 
for  its  own  sake,  or  sacrifice  a  merit  in  itself. 

Jesus  did  not  endure  sacrifice  for  the  sake  of  sacrifice. 
He  does  not  demand  sacrifice  from  us  for  the  sake  of 
sacrifice.  It  was  for  the  joy  that  was  set  before  Him 
that  He  endured  the  cross  and  despised  the  shame. 

—20— 


OUR      REASONABLE      SERVICE 

God  knowS'  the  joy  of  sacrifice.  Jesus  Christ  re- 
vealed the  sacrificial  joy  of  God.  And  he  revealed  these 
things  to  ns  that  the  same  spirit  of  sacrifice  might  be 
in  us,  and  that  our  joy  might  be  full. 

Do  you  not  understand  the  meaning  of  those  words, 
the  joy  of  sacrifice?  You  do  understand,  every  one  of 
you.  Not  one  of  you  puts  into  his  charity  account  his 
expenses  for  the  education  of  his  own  children.  It 
has  been  a  joy  to  sacrifice  for  them ;  and  it  is  the  joy 
of  God  to  give  Himself  in  sacrifice  for  us. 

Paul  might  have  besought  us  by  some  other  motive. 
He  knew  the  terror  of  the  Lord,  and  by  it  could  persuade 
men.  He  knew  the  desire  for  the  crown  laid  up  for 
him  who  is  faithful.  But  he  beseeches  us  by  God's 
mercies,  and  not  by  His  terror;  by  His  love  and  not  His 
wrath. 

This  is  why  the  cross  of  Christ  brings  men  to  God. 
It  is  the  standard  round  which  men  can  rally  in  the 
spirit  of  God,  because  it  is  there  that  they  understand 
the  heart  of  God  in  something  native  to  themselves.  This 
is  why  the  sacrifice  of  Christ,  try  hard  as  we  may  to 
misunderstand  it,  still  appeals  to  the  deepest  and  truest 
part  of  our  life.  It  is  the  thing  which  somehow  we 
understand  best  of  all. 

We  ought  by  this  time  to  be  able  to  understand 
Paul's  theory  of  sacrifice.  In  so  far  as  it  prepares  men 
to  accept  the  sacrifice  of  Jesus,  he  is  in  s3aTipathy  with 
it;  in  so  far  as  it  rises  as  a  barrier  between  men  and  the 
sacrifice  of  God,  he  repudiates  it.  But  whether  a  man 
comes  to  God  by  the  red  way  of  the  Jewish  law  or  not, 
the  thing  he  wishes  to  make  plain  is  this,  that  God  has 
no  pleasure  in  dead  sacrifices.  God  is  not  the  God  of 
the  dead.     Christ  is  not  silent  in  the  grave.     God  deals 

—21— 


OUR      REASONABLE      SERVICE 

not  with  the  dead  bodies  of  beasts,  but  with  the  living 
hearts  of  men.  And  so  Paul's  appeal  is  that  men  present 
their  bodies,  living  and  normal,  and  full  of  hope  and  the 
joy  of  life,  a  living  sacrifice  to  God. 

It  is  our  reasonable  service.  And  it  is  much  that  God 
cares  to  put  the  matter  on  that  plane.  The  pagan  who 
hurls  himself  under  Juggernaut  does  so  under  no  de- 
lusion that  this  is  a  reasonable  thing  for  his  god  to  ask. 
No  voice  speaks  to  the  heathen  mother  hurling  her  babe 
into  the  Ganges  to  make  that  sacrifice  appear  reasonable. 
No  one  pretends  that  it  is  reasonble.  Every  one  recog- 
nized that  it  is  unreasonable.  But  God  descends  to  the 
plane  where  man  lives  and  sufifers  and  aspires,  and  shows 
the  kinship  between  God  and  man,  and  asks  of  us  a 
reasonable  service.  That  is  one  of  the  finest  things  in  the 
Christian  faith.  We  have  no  arbitrary  God,  no  arbitrary 
law,  no  arbitrary  sacrifice  grounded  on  what  we  know 
not,  but  a  reasonable  service,  even  as  judged  by  the  mind 
of  man.  This  is  the  meeting  point  of  God  and  man,  at 
the  cross  of  Christ.  This  is  where  He,  being  lifted  up, 
draws  men  to  God  and  to  His  reasonable  service. 

I  remember  a  story  I  heard  an  evangelist  tell  in  my 
boyhood  concerning  a  man  who  lived  not  far  from  the 
kingdom,  who  attended  an  evangelistic  meeting  and  was 
much  disposed  to  give  his  heart  to  God,  but  who  tried 
to  put  the  thought  aside,  and  returned  to  his  home.  Still, 
the  thought  was  with  him,  and  he  walked  up  and  down 
in  his  own  library,  thinking  about  it.  As  his  eyes  ran 
aimlessly  over  the  backs  of  the  books,  he  noticed  one 
which  he  had  never  read,  and  which  so  far  as  I  re- 
member, he  did  not  open  even  then,  but  this  title  struck 
him: 

"THE  REASONABLENESS  OF  RELIGION" 
"Is  religion  reasonable?"  he  asked;  and  the  answer 
—22— 


OUR     REASONABLE      SERVICE 

came  straight  from  his  own  soul,  "Yes  it  is.  It  helps 
men  to  make  the  most  of  life;  to  realize  their  own  best 
good,  and  to  promote  the  welfare  of  their  fellow  men. 
It  makes  this  world  better,  and  gives  hope  for  the  life 
everlasting.  Religion  is  reasonable,  and  I  am  a  reason- 
able man.     I  will  be  a  Christian." 

This  is  as  I  remember  the  story,  and  I  recall  that 
the  point  which  the  evangelist  was  making  was  that  this 
man's  conversion  was  just  as  real  and  genuine  as  though 
he  had  agonized  for  hours  at  the  mourners'  bench.  It 
impressed  me  in  my  boyhood,  and  it  still  impresses  me, 
as  a  wise  and  sane  illustration,  and  I  give  it  to  you. 
Is  religion  reasonable?  Very  well  then;  you  are  reason- 
able men  and  women;  why  should  it  be  necessary  to 
say  any  more  about  it?  Why  not  at  once  decide,  and 
joyfully,  to  do  what  is  your  reasonable  service? 

As  you  hurry  through  the  streets  of  Chicago,  you 
notice  great  bunches  of  handbills  fluttering  from  the 
postboxes.  Those  boxes,  the  property  of  the  United 
States,  are  thus  used  to  distribute  circulars  inviting  men 
to  enlist  in  the  regular  army.  I  have  pulled  one  off  now 
and  then,  and  glanced  it  over  on  the  elevated  trains.  It 
is  very  attractively  printed  in  two  colors,  and  contains 
a  very  enticing  appeal.  It  tells  how  generous  the  wages 
are,  and  how  the  money  can  all  be  saved,  because  board 
a!nd  clothes  are  furnished  in  addition.  It  sets  forth  the 
opportunity  to  see  the  world,  and  very  many  other 
pleasant  perquisites  which  accompany  five  years  of  serv- 
ice in  the  regular  army.  I  have  read  all  this,  but  have 
not  enlisted.  I  have  a  good,  steady  job,  and  am  not 
in  the  least  tempted  to  go  and  become  a  soldier.  And 
I  have  not  missed  many  men  out  of  my  congregation  by 
reason  of  this  appeal  which  is  made  to  them  every  day 
as  they  pass  the  recruiting  offices  in  the  city. 

—23— 


OUR     REASONABLE      SERVICE 

But  I  can  imagine  how  it  could  all  be  very  different. 
If  on  a  Sunday  morning  I  should  tell  you  that  Central 
America  and  Mexico,  let  us  say,  had  joined  to  declare  war 
on  the  United  States ;  that  our  country  had  been  invaded ; 
that  atrocities  were  being  committed  against  our  fellow 
citizens ;  that  a  fanatical  spirit  of  Catholicism  had  joined  in 
the  attack,  and  that  our  land  and  our  homes  and  our  faith 
were  all  in  peril,  that  would  be  a  very  different  matter. 
I  can  imagine  that  we  might  spread  out  the  muster  roll 
on  the  communion  table,  yes,  on  the  communion  table, 
which  we  never  use  for  other  than  sacred  purposes;  I 
can  imagine  that  on  this  very  day  we  might  spread  it 
there,  and  the  appeal  might  be  made  for  men  to  fight 
for  their  country  and  their  faith.  I  can  imagine  myself 
saying,  "I  will  go  and  carry  a  gun  in  such  a  cause;  who 
will  go  with  me?"  I  can  imagine  that  men  would  enlist 
who  are  over  the  age  limit,  and  boys  who  are  too  young 
would  plead  to  go.  It  would  not  be  necessary  to  tell 
them  how  large  the  pay  was  to  be,  not  how  good  the 
opportunity  to  see  the  world ;  we  should  not  need  the 
attractive  hand  bills,  but  only  the  call  to  sacrifice. 

Tell  me,  my  friends,  tell  me  how  I  shall  make  this 
appeal  for  the  service  of  Jesus  Christ  in  that  fashion ! 
I  am  not  willing  to  think  of  it  as  though  I  were  merely 
hanging  out  a  bunch  of  invitations  Sunday  after  Sunday, 
picturing  in  attractive  terms  the  Christian  life,  and  see- 
ing them  neglected  or  merely  glanced  at  and  ignored. 
How  shall  I  make  you  understand  that  this  is  an  appeal 
to  you?  God's  government  has  been  assailed.  Jesus 
Christ  is  fighting  the  great  battle  of  His  life.  God, 
who  has  offered  Himself  in  sacrifice  for  you,  asks  of 
you  this  reasonable  sacrifice. 


Seeing  antr  Peliebing 


Jesus  saith  unto  him,  Thomas,  because  thou  hast  seen  me, 
thou  hast  believed;  blessed  are  they  that  have  not  seen,  and  yet 
have  believed.     John  20:  29. 


We  are  much  indebted  to  Thomas  for  doubting;  it 
makes  our  own  faith  the  easier  when  we  know  that 
among  the  disciples  were  those  who  were  not  too  easily 
convinced.  Yet  there  was  in  the  expression  of  his  doubt 
a  certain  harsh  materialism  which  we  cannot  wholly 
commend.  He  asked  what,  for  the  disciples  in  later 
ages,  was  to  be  an  impossible  test.  He  reduced  faith  to- 
its  lowest  terms  of  dependence  upon  the  senses.  Blessed 
are  they  who,  with  all  his  stubborn  refusal  to  accept 
as  true  what  may  not  be  true,  still  find  their  assurance  of 
spiritual  realities  in  proofs  not  wholly  material. 

"Seeing  is  believing."  Not  always.  I  saw  the  sun 
rise  this  morning,  but  I  believe  that  instead  of  that,  the 
earth  turned  round.  I  met  a  friend  in  the  postofifice  a 
few  days  ago,  and  he  took  a  half  dollar  that  had  just  been 
handed  him  in  change  at  the  stamp  window,  and  passed 
it  through  my  hat.  I  saw  it  and  did  not  believe  it.  He 
laughed  and  said  it  was  a  little  trick  he  learned  when  he 
was  younger  than  he  now  is,  and  which  he  performs  less 
frequently  than  he  formerly  was  accustomed  to  do. 
We  have  constantly  to  correct  the  testimony  of  our 
senses  by  our  larger  knowledge.  The  little  that  we  see 
demands  for  its  rational  explanation  a  vast  world  that 
we  do  not  see. 

And  thus  we  not  only  refuse  to  believe  some  things 
we  see,  but  we  are  compelled  to  believe  very  much  that 
is  unseen.  I  never  have  seen  gravitation,  nor  inter- 
stellar ether,  nor  the  vibrations  of  a  musical  sound,  nor 

—25— 


SEEING     AND      BELIEVING 

the  waves  of  a  wireless  message.  All  these  unseen  things 
are  so  wonderful,  and  call  for  such  a  strain  upon  the 
imagination  that  I  should  refuse  to  believe  them  if  they 
did  not  appear,  at  the  present  moment,  the  least  possible 
of  all  the  demands  on  faith  in  the  unseen  to  interpret 
the  things  which  are  seen. 

The  little  we  know  is  very  precious ;  but  the  world 
of  our  knowledge  is  an  exceedingly  small  one,  and  we 
walk  not  by  faith  and  not  by  sight. 

I  am  impressed  with  the  magnitude  of  the  miracles 
in  when  men  believe  who  reject  the  Gospel.  I  have 
frequently  known  a  man  who  accounts  the  Gospel  to 
be  incredible  who  reacts  to  a  vastly  greater  strain  upon 
credulity.  Professor  Lombroso  was  a  thorough-going 
materialist,  and  by  his  very  insistence  on  evidence  that 
could  be  weighed  and  measured,  he  was  prepared  to 
lend  his  name  to  the  foisting  upon  the  civilized  world  of 
that  combination  of  hysteria  and  palpable  fraud,  Eusapia. 
the  Neapolitian  medium.  And  our  recent  magazines  are 
full  of  her  mysterious  but  stupid  and  useless  and  fraud- 
ulent tricks.  I  say  again,  the  extreme  materialistic  posi- 
tfon,  far  from  guarding  a  man  against  impositions,  often 
prepares  a  hard-headed  man  to  fall  an  easy  prey  to  them. 
I  should  like  you  to  think  of  all  the  frauds  you  have 
ever  known  in  the  realm  of  the  marvelous  and  the  super- 
natural, and  see  if  there  was  one  of  them  that  was  not 
vouched  for  by  some  thorough-going  skeptic,  who  very 
likely  was  also  a  university  graduate. 

Think  of  a  Harvard  professor  exhibiting  to  a  body  of 
learned  men  in  Boston  an  Oriental  religionist,  who  in 
proof  of  his  religion,  climbed  a  ladder  of  swords !  I,  too, 
have  seen  that  trick,  and  did  not  believe  it.  That  is,  I 
believed  that  I  saw  it,  and  that  the  feet  were  bare  and 

—26— 


SEEING     AND      BELIEVING 

that  the  swords  were  very  sharp,  for  it  was  broad  day- 
light, and  I  stood  close,  and  handled  the  swords  and 
talked  with  the  dervish ;  but  while  I  could  not  explain  it, 
and  counted  it  a  wonder  beside  which  all  the  triumphs 
of  Christian  Science  over  matter  are  mere  child's  play, 
I  knew  it  was  a  trick,  and  only  a  trick. 

Begin  by  denying  anything  you  know  to  be  true, 
and  you  land  in  intellectual  confusion,  and  prepare  your- 
self for  something  far  less  credible  than  what  you 
have  rejected.  For  instance,  deny  the  reality  of  matter, 
and  you  face  the  absurdity  of  your  position  the  next 
instant.  Is  it  possible  that  there  should  be  a  cavity  in 
a  tooth?  The  cavity  being  there,  do  you  deny  it  or  fill  it? 
Is  it  possible  to  get  a  cinder  in  your  eye?  When  it  is 
there,  which  is  the  right  method  of  treatment,  to  remove 
it  or  deny  it?  Every  sane  man  knows  the  answer;  and 
these  two  simple  questions  are  all  that  need  be  asked. 
The  whole  pretentious  and  absurd  system  sinks  to  un- 
fathomable depths  in  the  cavity  of  a  tooth,  or  dashes 
itself  to  pieces  against  a  cinder  in  the  eye. 

Deny  evil,  which  you  know  exists,  and  what  happens? 
What  happens  to  Mrs.  Eddy  when  she  wants  to  write 
to  Mrs.  Stetson?  She  certainly  writes  as  if  she  thought 
evil  was  a  very  real  thing  in  those  who  oppose  her! 
And,  inasmuch  as  all  evil  is  now  gone,  we  must  install 
in  its  place  "M.  A.  M.,"  a  very  real  and  terrible  god  of 
intangible  evil,  whose  name  spelled  out  in  full  is  "Ma- 
licious Animal  Magnetism."  Before  this  creature  be- 
gotten of  a  puerile  imagination  and  of  senile  terror,  we 
are  to  stand  in  greater  awe  than  formerly  we  cherished 
toward  the  devil.  I  have  no  special  fondness  for  the 
devil,  nor  do  I  think  that  any  important  article  of  belief 
depends   upon   him.     I    can   spare   him   without   regret. 

—27— 


SEEING     AND      BELIEVING 

But  this  recrudescense  of  the  essential  forms  of  belief  in 
witchcraft  or  of  the  evil  eye  shows  us  how  much  the  less 
of  two  evils  a  good  orthodox  devil  might  be.  If  I  must 
have  a  devil  I  want  one  that  will  stay  put.  I  refuse  to 
tremble  at  the  name  and  power  of  "M.  A.  M."  And  I 
mention  it  only  to  show  what  a  red  hot  leap  such  follies 
involve  out  of  the  frying  pan.  The  denial  of  tangible 
reality  means  mental  chaos. 

I  see  other  things  and  do  not  believe  them.  I  went 
to  an  evening  meeting  in  which  men  and  women  testified 
to  their  wonderful  cures.  Toward  the  close  those  who 
had  the  meeting  in  charge  challenged  any  one  present 
who  did  not  believe  these  things  to  say  so.  I  had  not 
expected  to  participate  in  the  meeting,  but  I  rose  and 
said  that  I  was  not  convinced  by  anything  I  had  heard ; 
for  if  these  things  proved  the  truth  of  that  system, 
they  also  must  be  conceded  to  prove  the  truth  of  several 
others  too  absurd  to  be  accepted.  One  of  those  who 
had  spoken  asked  me,  "Do  you  believe  that  these  people 
tell  lies  when  they  say  they  are  cured?"  I  answered 
that  I  believed  they  were  honest,  but  not  always  truth- 
ful. I  said,  "I  am  not  sure  how  sick  some  of  them  were 
before,  nor  how  well  some  of  the  others  are  now." 

There  was  one  man  present  that  night  whom  I  saw, 
and  whose  testimony  I  heard.  He  said  he  had  had  an 
error  diagnosed  as  cancer  of  the  stomach,  and  the  doctors 
had  told  him  he  must  die,  but  that  he  had  found  this 
truth,  and  was  well.  I  saw  this  man,  and  heard  him, 
and  judged  him  to  be  honest,  but  did  not  feel  in  the  least 
convinced.  I  also  saw  his  case  widely  published,  and 
recognized  it  in  print ;  for  that  organization  has  an  active 
press  bureau.  But  with  all  their  admirable  facilities  for 
making  news  of  their  sect  knov/n,  they  strangely  omitted 

—28— 


SEEING     AND      BELIEVING 

to  tell  the  public  what  happened  shortly  afterward.  This 
same  man  went  home  from  one  of  these  same  meetings 
and  died  of  hemorrhage,  and  the  autopsy  showed  that 
he  had  just  exactly  what  the  doctors  said  he  had,  and 
that  he  never  had  been  cured. 

There  is  much  that  we  see  and  do  not  believe,  and 
that  with  good  reason.  If  you  degrade  the  proofs  of 
religion  to  the  merely  physical,  you  enter  a  region  where 
you  are  hopelessly  out  of  competition.  There  is  no  mod- 
ern cult  now  operating  in  America  that  can  compare 
for  the  wonders  that  it  works  with  some  of  the  super- 
stitions of  the  East.  If  you  are  to  become  a  Christian 
Scientist  because  of  wonders  which  appeal  to  the  senses, 
the  same  logic  will  drive  you  farther,  and  give  you  some 
religion  that  does  not  pretend  to  be  Christian,  and  which 
is  nearly  if  not  quite  as  unscientific. 

No  man  is  justified  in  believing  only  what  he  may 
see.  There  are  other  proofs  than  those  that  are  material. 
We  are  finding  all  the  time  new  spheres  in  which  our 
knowledge  penetrates  a  little  farther  into  the  penumbra 
of  the  unknown,  but  still  we  walk  by  faith,  not  by 
sight. 

You  would  believe  in  God  if  you  could  measure  His 
energy  in  volts  and  amperes ;  yet  how  long  ago  was  it 
that  you  learned  anything  about  amperage  and  voltage? 
And  for  that  matter,  how  much  do  you  understand  about 
it  now? 

It  is  no  more  incredible  that  there  should  be  a  God, 
creating  and  governing  all  things  for  a  vast  moral 
destiny,  than  that  there  should  be  gravitation,  holding  an 
unbounded  universe  through  ages  that  had  no  beginning 
or  end,  and  sustaining  worlds  unsupported  in  a  vast 
space  in  which  a  million  miles'  journey  would  bring  you 

—29— 


SEEING     AND     BELIEVING 

no  nearer  to  one  outside  nor  take  you  farther  from 
another. 

It  is  no  more  incredible  that  a  wise  and  loving  God 
should  find  ways  of  revealing  His  truth  to  men  than  it 
is  that  wireless  messages  should  penetrate  the  ether  un- 
impeded by  material  obstacles. 

It  is  not  very  wonderful,  if  God  has  placed  us  here 
in  a  very  strange  world,  that  He  should  tell  us  not  only 
what  to  do,  but  show  us  how  to  do  it.  His  great  object 
lesson  of  what  human  life  ought  to  be,  and  what  divine 
life  is,  might  very  reasonably  be  expressed  in  terms  that 
are  common  to  both.  This  is  not  improbable,  but  is  a 
rational,  logical  and  entirely  credible  phenomenon.  It 
makes  its  own  appeal  to  the  hearts  of  men,  and  enables 
them  to  say  not  merely  that  the  historic  Jesus  lived,  but 
that  the  essential  Christ  still  lives.  Then  we  understand 
why  Jesus  blessed  those  who  believe  more  than  they  see. 
We  understand  why  Paul  counted  spiritual  proof  the 
highest  proof,  and  said,  "Yea,  though  we  have  known 
Christ  after  the  flesh,  now  henceforth  know  we  him  no 
more."  We  understand  what  Peter  meant,  when  he 
said  of  Jesus,  "Whom,  having  not  seen,  ye  love ;  in 
whom  though  now  ye  see  Him  not,  yet  believing,  ye 
rejoice  with  joy  unspeakable  and  full  of  glory." 

I  insist  that  such  faith  is  rational.  I  deny  that  it  is 
unscientific.  The  truly  scientific  men  are  they  who,  in 
explaining  the  things  we  see,  compel  us  to  believe  in 
things  that  we  cannot  see.  No  man  can  be  a  scientist 
who  believes  only  what  he  sees.  He  cannot  even  believe 
in  his  own  brains  if  he  limits  his  faith  to  his  sight. 

I  have  great  respect  for  Thomas.  I  cannot  forget 
his  word  of  fine  heroism,  "Let  us  go  also  with  him,  that 
we  may  die  with  him."     I  do  not  blame  him  for  wanting 

—30— 


SEEING     AND      BELIEVING 

proof.  But  I  insist  that  the  sphere  within  which  proof 
may  be  admitted  is  wider  than  Thomas  considered.  Our 
own  souls,  their  aspirations,  their  needs,  their  firm  af- 
firmation of  the  right,  their  insistant  refusal  to  accept 
other  than  truth  and  life  as  the  final  facts,  these  are  part 
of  the  proof. 

The  chief  criticism  which  occurs  to  me  concerning 
those  who  call  themselves  Rationalists  is  that  they  are 
not  sufficiently  rational ;  and  again  those  who  call  them- 
selves positivists  that  they  deal  so  largely  with  the  things 
that  are  negative.  It  is  not  rational  to  ignore  the  deepest 
longings  and  the  highest  aspirations  of  the  human  soul. 
The  things  that  may  be  seen  and  handled  are  not  more 
positive  than  those  that  may  be  apprehended  by  the 
affections.  The  world  without  is  not  more  real  than 
the  soul  within.  Matter  is  not  more  evident  than  mind; 
nor  have  we  any  right  to  affirm  that  it  is  less  destruct- 
ible. The  soul  itself  is  creative,  and  so  far  as  any  man 
can  know,  there  is  nothing  in  all  the  world  of  sense 
more  real,  or  more  eternal. 

It  is  reasonable  to  believe  in  a  God,  eternal  and  in- 
visible, of  whom  the  visible  things  from  the  creation 
testify,  even  His  eternal  power  and  Godhead.  I  am  con- 
scious of  no  logical  strain  in  possessing  faith  like  this, 
for  I  am  incapable  of  that  larger  faith  which  I  should  be 
compelled  to  hold  if  I  believed  that  this  vast  universe  had 
in  it  and  behind  it  no  conscious  mind,  no  righteous  plan, 
no  fatherly  love. 

It  is  reasonable  to  believe  in  a  revelation  from  God ; 
and  I  cannot  bring  myself  to  that  larger  demand  upon 
my  faith  which  would  be  compelled  of  me  if  I  believed 
that  God  has  made  us  with  spirits  kindred  to  His  own, 

—31— 


SEEING     AND      BELIEVING 

and  left  us  without  knowledge  of  His  will  concerning 
ourselves  and  the  world. 

It  is  reasonable  to  believe  in  a  Christ,  who  spelled  out 
in  the  simple  syllables  of  our  earthly  life  the  eternal 
verities  of  God's  nature  and  will,  and  of  our  human  Hope 
and  destiny. 

It  is  reasonable  to  believe  that  all  worlds  belong  to 
one  God ;  that  all  human  life  partakes  of  His  life ;  that 
this  present  world  is  not  isolated  from  the  eternal  in- 
terests of  the  universe ;  but  that  there  exists  a  world  of 
which  our  own  souls  give  us  faint  but  credible  intima- 
tions, and  of  which  we  have  had  dim  though  precious 
glimpses  through  our  tears — a  world  whose  full  glory 
eye  hath  not  seen,  nor  ear  heard,  neither  hath  entered 
into  the  heart  of  man. 

Still,  as  ever,  the  things  that  are  seen  are  temporal, 
and  very  full  of  possibilities  of  misinterpretation;  but 
the  things  that  are  not  seen  are  the  eternal  things. 

Blessed  are  they  who  have  not  seen,  and  yet  have 
believed. 


—32- 


Wf^t  l&eligtousi  Wisitsi  of  tfie  3masmatton 


By  faith  he  forsook  Egypt,  not  fearing  the  wrath  of  the 
king;  for  he  endured  as  seeing  him  who  is  invisible.  Hebrews 
11:27. 

If  Rameses  II.  was  emperor  of  Egypt  in  the  time  of 
the  Exodus,  and  we  have  good  reason  to  believe  that  he 
was,  he  was  a  very  real  king.  He  wrote  his  name  on  the 
most  stupendous  monuments  of  Egypt.  He  stands  apart 
from  all  the  great  kings  of  that  fascinating  land,  in  the 
length  of  his  reign  and  the  greatness  of  his  personality. 
The  book  of  Exodus  helps  us  to  locate  the  oppression  in 
his  reign,  by  giving  his  name  as  that  of  one  of  the  two 
treasure  cities  built  by  the  oppressed  Hebrews;  and  we 
have  unearthed  one  of  those  very  cities  and  find  his  name 
stamped  on  each  of  the  bricks  that  represent  the  cruel 
task  of  his  foreign  subjects.  His  name  to  this  day  is 
greatest  of  all  names  of  past  monarchs  in  the  land  of 
the  Nile ;  and  in  his  own  day  he  must  have  thrown  into 
eclipse  all  names  of  other  kings  in  that  land  and  in  every 
other.  Yet  Moses  had  a  vision  that  made  God  more 
real  than  Rameses.  So  real  was  God  that  Moses  did 
not  fear  the  king,  but  forsook  Egypt,  and  "endured  as 
seeing  Him  who  is  invisible." 

The  ability  to  see  that  which  is  invisible  is  a  gift  of 
the  imagination.  It  is  a  product  of  the  picture-making 
power  of  the  human  mind.  It  is  that  which  gives  us 
ability  to  conceive  of  objects  apart  from  their  tangible 
appearance.  Moses  must  have  been  a  man  of  mighty 
imagination  if  God  seemed  to  him  more  real  than 
Pharoah.     No   man  whose  field   of  vision   was  arrested 

33 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

b}^  the  horizon  of  sense  could  have  done  what  Moses 
did. 

It  is  undeniable  that  in  this  present  age  the  imagina- 
tion is  under  a  certain  suspicion.  We  are  the  worshipers 
of  "the  God  of  things  as  they  are."  We  are  living  in  an 
age  whose  inquisitive  and  not  always  reverent  finger  is 
outstretched  and  ready  to  penetrate  the  quivering  nail- 
print  of  truth.  In  such  an  age  the  imagination  falls 
under  the  ban.  People  still  employ  the  imagination,  but 
are  ashamed  to  admit  it.  They  think  of  the  imaginative 
man  as  visionary  and  unreliable,  dealing  with  things 
unreal.    They  count  him  an  unsafe  guide. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  imagination  is  one  of  our 
most  useful  faculties.  And  by  no  people  is  it  more 
needed  than  those  who  are  desirous  of  knowing  actual 
facts,  apart  from  all  that  is  visionary  and  unreal.  We, 
more  than  most  people  who  have  lived  before  us,  need 
the  power  of  imagination.  We  need  it  in  education ;  we 
need  it  in  exploration  after  truth ;  we  need  it  in  our 
efforts  after  culture  through  music  and  art;  and  most 
of  all,  we  need  it  in  religion. 

We  are  considering  this  morning,  the  Religious  Uses 
of  the  Imagination. 

I.— The  Idea  of  God 

The  imagination  is  necessary  to  the  formation  of  an 
idea  of  God.  God  is  invisible,  intangible,  and  cannot 
be  apprehended  by  any  of  our  five  senses.  Our  evidence 
that  He  exists  is  partly  to  be  found  in  the  world  about 
us.  and  partly  in  the  soul  within.  But  having  convinced 
ourselves  by  a  process  of  reasoning  that  the  world  in 
its  creation  must  have  had,  and  in  its  operation  still  must 
have,  an  adequate  cause,  and  that  the  moral  sense  and 

34 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

conscience  of  man  cannot  be  at  variance  with  the  essen- 
tial purpose  of  Him  who  made  us,  how  can  we  make 
God  real  to  our  minds?     Only  by  the  imagination. 

And  even  though  we  know  that  all  our  anthropo- 
morphic ideas  of  God  are  defective,  yet  we  cannot 
wholly  be  misled  by  them.  We  are  safe  in  imagining 
God  as  the  soul  of  the  universe,  vitally  concerned  in  all 
that  makes  for  the  moral  welfare  of  mankind,  and  in 
thinking  of  Him  in  such  relations  as  make  that  faith 
real. 

It  cannot  be  wondered  at  that  men  in  all  ages  have 
sought  some  tangible  form  which  they  could  identify 
with  their  idea  of  God.  The  worship  of  graven  images 
is  the  pathetic  confession  of  a  limited  imagination  cry- 
ing out  for  something  visible  that  it  may  call  God.  But 
the  command  which  says,  "Thou  shalt  not  make  unto 
thee  any  graven  images,"  and  which  applies  as  truly  to 
forms  of  words  and  syllogisms  as  it  does  to  things  of 
wood  and  stone,  as  truly  to  logic  as  to  creations  of 
plastic  art,  denies  to  man  the  poor  solace  of  a  visible  and 
impotent  deity  that  it  may  cast  him  back  on  the  surer 
ground  of  his  own  imagination.  There  with  the  eyes 
of  imagination  turned  inward  to  behold  what  God  has 
revealed  of  Himself  in  human  life,  the  worshiper  finds 
God  in  the  mirror  of  the  human  soul. 

The  men  who  wrote  the  Bible  were  men  of  imagina- 
tion. You  cannot  read  the  Bible  as  it  ought  to  be  read, 
you  cannot  apprehend  its  glowing  figures  of  speech, 
without  the  imagination.  We  may  not  be  sure  just 
what  constituted  the  quality  we  term  "inspiration,"  but 
we  may  be  sure  that  no  man,  destitute  of  an  imagination, 
ever  was  inspired,  or  ever  could  have  been.     And  how 

35 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

is  the  Bible  to  become  an  inspired  book  except  to  an 
inspired  man?  Paul  says  it  cannot,  and  Paul  is  good 
authority. 

2. — The  Interpretation  of  History 

The  imagination  is  necessary  to  an  interpretation  of 
history.  It  is  only  as  we  are  able  to  think  ourselves 
back  into  the  conditions  of  past  ages  that  we  can  under- 
stand the  men  and  women  of  the  past.  It  is  neither  just 
nor  effective  for  our  thinking  to  take  our  stand  in  the 
present,  and  by  mere  strain  of  intellect  to  endeavor  to 
understand  the  past.  We  can  understand  David  only  by 
placing  ourselves  in  the  conditions  in  which  David  lived. 
We  can  understand  the  apostles  only  as  we  number 
ourselves  among  them.  There  can  be  no  real  philosophy 
of  history  without  the  historic  imagination.  We  can 
understand  the  men  of  the  Bible  only  as  we  live  through 
the  successive  ages  of  the  Bible. 

And  what  a  demand  this  makes  upon  us !  We  must 
go  back  in  our  thought  to  the  beginnings  of  the  human 
race :  to  the  dawn  of  moral  and  spiritual  ideas ;  to  the 
time  when  God  was  leading  men  by  the  seemingly  round- 
about way  of  strange  worship  and  bloody  sacrifices ; 
to  the  time  when  the  first  benefactors  of  the  human  race 
were  emerging  from  the  chaos  and  brutality  about  them ; 
to  the  days  when  mankind  was  learning  the  simplest 
truths  about  decency  and  the  basis  of  family  life ;  to  the 
time  when  social  organizations  were  beginning  in  crude 
tribal  combinations  for  mutual  protection.  We  must 
go  back  to  those  days,  and  climb  up  that  weary  but 
gainful  pilgrimage  with  our  forefathers  through  the 
struggle  of  man  against  nature,  wild  beasts,  and  in- 
herited tendencies  to  brutality  which  they  had  come  to 

36 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

know  as  sin.  And  we  must  see  the  hand  of  God  in  it  all, 
preparing  the  world  for  the  Gospel. 

Then  we  must  come  on  to  other  ages,  in  which  patri- 
archal governments  were  established.  We  must  walk 
with  Abraham  among  his  flocks  and  herds,  and  hear  the 
call  of  God  as  Abraham  heard  it,  sending  him  forth  to 
found  a  great  nation.  It  is  not  enough  that  we  read 
how  Abraham  went;  we  must  go  with  him. 

We  must  go  into  Egypt  with  his  descendants.  We 
must  be  of  them,  and  toil  with  them  in  the  brick-yards. 
And,  that  we  may  understand  both  sides  of  the  problem, 
we  must  sometimes  be  Pharoah,  proud,  haughty  and 
determined  to  leave  a  name  to  all  the  ages  as  the  greatest 
of  the  kings  of  the  land  of  the  Nile. 

We  must  hide  ourselves  with  Moses  in  the  rushes  of 
the  Nile.  We  must  flee  with  him  into  the  wilderness. 
We  must  kneel  with  him  at  the  burning  bush.  We  must 
hear  the  voice  that  he  heard,  calling  him  back  to  Egypt, 
and  then  sending  him  forth  from  Egypt,  enduring  as 
seeing  the  invisible   God. 

We  must  follow  the  Ark  through  the  wilderness  and 
the  sea.  We  must  go  with  it  in  the  long  march  around 
Jericho,  and  follow  its  fortunes  through  subsequent  years 
till  we  enter  with  it  into  Jerusalem,  crying,  "Lift  up 
your  heads,  O  ye  gates,  and  the  King  of  Glory  shall 
come  in !" 

We  must  live  in  that  city  with  the  descendants  of 
David,  and  witness  and  share  the  changes  of  the  years 
that  follow.  We  must  go  into  Babylon  in  the  Exile; 
and  w'e  must  enter  Babylon  again  with  the  conquering 
army  of  Cyrus  the  Mede.  We  must  go  back  to  Jerusalem 
in  the  days  of  the  Persians,  and  rebuild  the  temple.     We 

37 


RELIGIOUS    USES     OF    THE    IMAGINATION 

must  follow  the  hosts  and  dwell  in  the  camps  of  the 
young  king  Alexander  the  Great,  whose  almost  incred- 
ible conquests  brought  the  world  to  the  foot  of  his 
throne.  We  must  fight  in  the  indomitable  armies  of  the 
Maccabees.  We  must  be  present  at  the  coronation  of 
the  Caesars.  We  must  witness  and  share  the  rise  of  the 
Herods.  We  must  follow  with  the  wise  men  the  path 
of  light  shed  over  the  sands  of  Arabia  by  the  Star  in 
the  East,  and  must  bow  with  them  in  reverence  before 
the  manger  of  Bethlehem. 

All  this  we  must  do,  and  more,  and  how  shall  we  dO' 
it  except  as  we  possess  the  rich  gift  of  an  enlightened 
imagination? 

3. — Selfhood  and  the  Ideal 

The  imagination  is  essential  to  the  formation  of  an 
ideal  for  ourselves.  The  word  of  the  ancient  oracle  was, 
"Man,  know  thyself."  But  no  man  knows  himself  who 
knows  only  what  he  is  today.  The  only  man  who  really 
knows  himself  is  the  man  who  knows  the  self  that  he 
may  become.  The  present  self  is  a  changing  self,  giving 
ofif  something  of  itself  with  every  breath,  and  building 
new  selfhood  out  of  every  crust  of  bread  that  it  eats,  and 
every  great  truth  it  learns.  To  know  myself  as  I  am 
this  moment  is  a  thing  of  interest,  and  may  perhaps  be 
done  in  part  by  means  of  scales  and  the  yard  stick. 
Certain  it  is  that  some  men  have  meant  little  more  than 
this  when  they  have  shouted  to  us  "Know  thyself,"  as  if 
that  were  the  final  word  of  wisdom.  To  know  myself  it  is 
not  enough  that  I  take  stock  of  my  present  passions, 
appetites  and  motives ;  I  am  more  than  all  these.  I  am 
these  plus  my  ideals.  And  the  ideals  are  the  most  real 
part  of  me.     In  my  own  heart  I  am  a  better  man  than 

38 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

I  ever  yet  have  become.  I  am  climbing  toward  the  at- 
tainment of  that  ideal.  And  shall  I  judge  of  myself 
by  what  I  am  alone?  As  well  might  I  judge  of  a 
cathedral  by  its  ground  plan.  Not  till  the  eye  has  fol- 
lowed the  lines  of  the  ground  plan  upward  to  the  very 
top  of  the  spire  do  we  know  the  cathedral.  Not  till  you 
know  the  topmost  flight  of  a  man's  ideal  do  you  know 
the  man. 

And  so  you  cannot  know  yourself  till  you  take  ac- 
count of  all  that  you  aspire  to  be,  yea,  and  of  those  un- 
awakened,  dormant  elements  in  your  own  selfhood, 
which  God  will  yet  rouse  to  life  and  earnestness  through 
the  power  of  faith,  and  fellowship  in  the  Gospel. 

"Be  what  you  would  seem"  is  good  advice.  "Believe 
you  are  what  you  want  to  be,"  is  equally  good  advice. 
'According  to  thy  faith,  thy  vision,  thy  belief  of  what 
thou  canst  be,  be  it  unto  thee." 

We  must  have  a  well  developed  imagination  to  save 
us  from  unworthy  ideals.  For  the  man  of  limited  im- 
agination, the  hard-headed,  unimaginative  man,  is  often 
the  first  to  be  imposed  upon,  and  that  in  the  very  realm 
of  which  he  counts  himself  to  be  the  master.  An  un- 
governed  imagination  becomes  a  cage  of  unclean  birds, 
and  is  a  terrible  thing  for  a  man  to  shelter  within  the 
sacred  precincts  of  his  soul.  But  a  man  devoid  of  im- 
agination, the  man  who  lives  on  the  plane  of  the  com- 
monplace, is  subject  to  all  manner  of  deceptions,  and  is 
often  the  first  to  be  carried  away  by  superficial  and 
pretentious  delusions  from  which  he  might  often  be 
delivered  by  enough  of  imagination  to  see  the  absurdity 
of  his  new  religion. 

39 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

4. — The  Practical  Uses  of  the  Imagination 

I  hope  that  these  things  which  I  am  saying  appeal  to 
you  as  of  sufficient  value  to  justify  this  sermon,  even 
if  it  did  not  enter  into  the  realm  of  the  so-called  practical. 
Yet,  because  there  is  a  legitimate  demand  that  the 
theoretical  shall  justify  itself  by  results  that  are  practical, 
let  me  say  that  in  every  important  sphere  in  life  the 
imagination   is   essential   to   practical    success. 

Let  me  call  your  attention  to  a  few  representative 
men  whose  work  is  nothing  if  not  practical. 

Consider  the  physician.  He  is  first  of  all  a  mechanical 
expert,  reducing  fractures  and  removing  foreign  bodies; 
and  after  that  he  is  a  chemist,  to  whom  the  human  body 
is  a  laboratory  with  certain  definite  reactions  following 
certain  acids,  alkalis  and  salts.  But  is  that  all?  The 
successful  physician  is  more  than  a  mechanic  and  a 
chemist;  he  does  more  than  treat  humanity  as  a  machine 
and  a  laboratory.  He  is  a  man  of  imagination,  sug- 
gesting the  results  he  hopes  to  produce,  and  picturing  to 
the  patient  the  well  man  he  wants  him  to  be.  Every 
true  healer  is  a  faith-healer.  Every  true  cure  is  wrought 
through  faith  and  prayer. 

Consider  the  lawyer.  He  is  not  content  merely  to 
mass  his  evidence  and  marshal  his  facts.  He  makes  a 
constant  appeal  to  the  imagination.  The  black  motives 
of  the  opposing  side  form  but  a  background  against 
which  he  paints  the  full-length  portrait  of  his  angelic 
client. 

Note  the  method  of  the  politician.  He  is  not  con- 
tent to  stand  on  the  rock-ribbed  platform  of  his  party. 
He  "points  with  pride"  to  its  illustrious  record,  and  he 

40 


RjELIGIOUS    USES     OF    THE    IMAGINATION 

"views  with  alarm"  the  disaster  which  is  sure  to  follow 
the  success  of  the  opposing  party. 

As  for  the  teacher,  if  he  teach  but  facts,  he  is  a  mere 
stick  in  the  school  room  ;  facts  are  but  the  raw  material 
of  his  instruction.  These  live  when  he  makes  them  real 
to  his  pupil;  and  that  is  the  province  of  the  imagination. 

As  for  the  inventor,  he  never  yet  blessed  the  world 
with  any  mechanism  that  released  the  weary  hand  from 
its  too  confining  task,  or  lifted  the  load  from  the  bent 
back  of  labor,  but  he  saw  the  machine  in  his  imagination 
before  as  yet  a  single  lever  or  pulley  or  wheel  of  it  ex- 
isted in  the  world  of  fact. 

Of  all  this  I  have  a  further  word  to  say,  but  I  desire 
to  emphasize  the  truth  that,  judged  by  these  tests,  the 
religious  uses  of  the  imagination  are  eminently  practical. 

We  need  the  imagination  in  religion  because  there  are 
tendencies  in  modern  life  which  stimulate  the  imagina- 
tion in  manners  unwholesome  save  as  they  yoke  them- 
selves to  righteous  motives  and  practical  courses  of  con- 
duct. The  reading  of  novels  and  the  witnessing  of 
theatrical  exhibitions  become  an  easy  peril  if  these  waken 
the  imagination  and  stir  the  sympathy,  but  give  us  no 
immediate  act  to  perform  for  righteousness.  But  the 
glory  of  the  religious  imagination  is  that  it  joins  itself 
at  once  to  some  practical  end.  It  shows  us  how  to  do 
what  Emerson  enjoined,  when  he  advised  us  to  hitch  our 
wagon  to  a  star.  It  saves  us  from  the  delusion  of  the 
commonplace  man  who  insists  that  a  star  cannot  pull 
a  wagon ;  for  it  shows  him  the  moon,  smallest  of  stars, 
pulling  the  tides  in  ceaseless  procession  round  the  globe, 
and  sets  him  to  wondering  what  a  really  great  star  can 
do  with  the  wagon  of  a  reasonable  man,  when  wheels 

41 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

are  oiled  and  the  wagon  is  headed  in  the  direction  of 
the  procession  of  the  stars.  And  then  on  the  other  hand, 
it  saves  us  from  the  undisciplined  imagination  which  is 
only  a  star,  and  hitched  to  nothing,  the  mere  comet  of  a 
capricious  mind,  fl3^ing  amuck  through  space,  and  finally 
knocking  itself  into  a  wreck  through  lack  of  an  orbit. 

Dickens  tells  of  a  certain  Mr.  Gadgrind,  who  con- 
stantly demanded  facts.  There  are  such  people,  and  they 
count  themselves  very  reasonable ;  but  men  do  not  live  by 
facts  alone,  but  by  faith,  and  hope  and  love.  They  do  not 
live  in  the  present  alone,  but  in  the  strenuous  struggle  of 
the  past,  and  in  the  glorious  triumph  of  the  future. 

The  proper  cultivation  of  the  imagination  saves  us 
from  the  Gadgrind  bondage  to  facts ;  it  saves  us  also 
from  sky-rocketing  through  the  empty  spaces  of  the 
unreal  in  search  for  the  impossible.  And  therefore  it 
justifies  me  in  saying  that  of  all  people  who  should  favor 
the  cultivation  of  the  imagination  in  things  religious  and 
truly  spiritual,  the  first  should  be  those  who  insist  upon 
those  things  that  are  practical.  ' 

5. — The   Scientific  Uses  of   the   Imagination 

In  this  exercise  of  the  imagination  in  the  sphere  of 
religion,  we  are  not  going  beyond  what  becomes  neces- 
sary in  the  sphere  of  science.  Great  scientists  have 
recognized  this,  foremost  among  them  Professor  Tyndall, 
who  in  the  beginning  of  his  second  lecture  on  Light,  says 
what  he  expresses  more  fully  in  his  "Fragments  of 
Science."  He  says  of  the  true  scientist  that  from  the 
very  outset  he  is  dependent  on  his  imagination : 

"He  cannot  consider,  much  less  answer,  the  question, 
'What  Is  Light?'  without  transporting  himself  to  a  world 
which  underlies   the  sensible  one.  and  out  of  wh'ch  m 

42 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

accordance  with  rigid  law,  all  optical  phenomena  spring. 
To  realize  this  sub-sensible  world,  if  I  may  use  the  term, 
the  mind  must  possess  a  certain  pictorial  power  It 
has  to  visualize  the  invisible  ....  This  conceptio:i  of 
physical  theory  implies,  as  you  perceive,  the  exercise  of 
the  imagination.  Do  not  be  afraid  of  this  word  .... 
I  do  not  mean  a  riotous  power  which  deals  capriciously 
with  facts,  but  a  well  disciplined  power  whose  sole 
function  it  is  to  form  conceptions  which  the  intellect 
imperatively  demands."  (pp.  34-5)  "He  must  visualize 
the  invisible."  So  said  Professor  Tyndall  of  the  scientist. 
"He  endured  as  seeing  Him  who  is  invisible."  So  says 
the  Bible  of  the  man  of  faith.  The  two  sound  very 
much  alike ;  the}'  ire  alike. 

All  we  are  claiming  for  the  super-sensible  world  is 
what  Professor  Tyndall  claims  for  the  sub-sensible 
world.  And  really  these  two,  and  the  world  of  sense, 
are  one  world,  three  in  one ;  and  no  one  of  the  three 
is  apprehended  wholly  without  the  imagination 

All  great  scientists,  therefore,  are  men  of  imagina- 
tion, and  hence  of  faith.  I  do  not  wonder  that  Professor 
Tyndall  thought  necessary  to  warn  men  of  the  scientific 
mind  not  to  be  afraid  of  the  word,  for  some  of  them  do 
not  know  how  much  they  owe  to  their  own  imagination, 
and  to  their  faith.  I  could  imdertake  to  add  some  verses 
to  the  eleventh  chapter  of  Hebrews  and  to  place  upon 
the  list  of  the  faithful  a  long  roll  of  names  of  men  of 
science,  whose  imagination  was  that  of  faith. 

P>3'  faith  Columbus,  when  he  was  called  of  God 
to  discover  a  new  continent,  went  out  not  knowing 
whither   he   went.      By   faith   he   sailed   strange   waters, 

43 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

with  Cabot,  Alagellan,  Vespvicius  and  Balboa,  the  heirs 
with  him  of  the  same  promise ;  and  they  beheld  rising 
from  the  waters,  new  heavens  and  a  new  earth,  fresh 
from  the  hand  of  God,  and  bestowed  upon  men  through 
faith. 

By  faith  Copernicus  lifted  the  earth  from  its  solid 
base  and  set  it  to  moving  in  rhythmic  order  round  the 
sun ;  by  faith  he  beheld  all  the  suns  and  suns  of  suns  with 
planets  in  bright  array,  circling  round  the  throne  of  God ; 
and  this  he  wrought  by  faith. 

By  faith  Galileo,  when  he  had  been  forced  to  recant, 
still  testified  that  the  earth  moves  ever  at  the  decree  of 
God ;  by  faith  he  endured  persecution  till  the  mind  of 
his  fellow  men  found  its  orbit  in  the  same  true  faith. 

By  faith  La  Place  understood  how  the  worlds  are 
made  from  star-dust,  and  framed  by  the  word  of  God, 
so  that  the  things  that  are  seen  in  the  making  take  their 
place  in  the  established  order  of  an  infinite  God  of  good- 
ness and  might. 

By  faith  Newton  beheld  in  the  fall  of  the  apple  the 
demonstration  of  an  all-pervading  force,  operating  by  the 
unchanging  will  of  God,  so  that  the  worlds  are  held  in 
place  and  that  not  by  the  things  that  do  appear. 

By  faith  Paracelsus,  when  he  was  a-dying,  bequeathed 
to  those  who  followed  him  an  imperfect  science,  much 
mixed  with  error,  but  left  the  inspiration  of  his  name  to 
others  through  whom  the  indivisible  elements  of  earth 
and  the  laws  that  combine  them  were  made  known. 

These  all  died  in  faith,  not  receiving  the  promises, 
but  were  persuaded  of  them  and  embraced  them  and 
moved  toward  them,  and  bequeathed  to  others  the 
heritage  of  their  faith. 

44 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

By  faith  men  suffered  persecution,  ridicule  and 
povert}',  and  walked  from  ofifice  to  office  wearily  and  in 
threadbare  garb,  trying-  to  enlist  the  sympathy  and  faith 
of  their  fellow  men  in  things  the  world  thought  vision- 
ary, choosing  rather  to  suffer  affliction  as  the  children 
of  faith  than  to  sell  their  vision  for  bread. 

And  as  for  Huxley  and  Darwin  and  Tyndall  and 
Spencer,  these,  too,  were  men  of  faith,  and  their  faith 
gave  substance  to  the  things  they  hoped  for,  and  led 
them  from  experiment  to  hypothesis,  and  from  hypoth- 
esis to  theory,  and  from  theory  to  discovery,  and  from 
faith  to  sight;  these  also  were  the  children  of  faith. 

And  what  shall  I  more  say?  For  the  time  would  fail 
me  to  tell  of  vStevenson  and  Fulton,  of  Morse  also  aiKl 
Edison,  and  Roentgen  and  Lister,  and  Cyrus  Field  and 
Bell,  of  Marconi  and  Wilbur  Wright,  who  through  faith 
made  iron  float,  yoked  chariots  to  the  invisible  power  of 
steam,  caused  the  human  voice  to  be  heard  at  a  distance 
of  a  thousand  miles,  brought  the  mind  of  man  into  touch 
with  that  of  his  fellow  man  beyond  the  sea,  filled  the 
air  with  voices  inaudible  to  the  ear  alone  and  intelligible 
only  to  the  mind  of  faith,  and  lifted  the  bodies  and  minds 
of  men  on  wings  of  wonder  and  set  them  to  sailing  amid 
the  clouds. 

Through  faith  they  built  railroads,  irrigated  deserts, 
and  crossed  the  trackless  ice  to  the  poles,  led  by  faith  in 
the  compass  and  the  friendly  stars.  By  faith  they  sub- 
dued climates,  overcame  hardships,  out  of  weakness 
were  made  strong,  added  to  the  span  of  human  life, 
wrought  wonders  incredible,  and  filled  the  pages  of 
scientific  periodicals  and  the  columns  of  the  daily  press 
with  the  news  of  their  achievements  that  ceased  to  be 

45 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

wonderful  through  their  very  incredibility  and  their 
certitude. 

Now  they  who  do  such  things  see  visions  of  them 
before  they  come  to  pass,  and  thus  are  men  of  faith.  And 
these  all,  and  they  who  labored  with  them  and  before 
them,  lived  in  faith,  and  those  who  died  died  in  faith, 
that  all  who  follow  may  add  their  knowledge  to  that 
which  is  gone  before,  and  the  world  by  the  gift  of  ail 
men  of  faith  at  last  shall  be  made  perfect. 

We  have  made  this  apparent  digression  that  we 
might  remind  ourselves  that  this  use  of  the  imagination 
in  the  sphere  of  faith  is  no  monopoly  of  religion.  And 
now  having  justified  it  by  reminding  ourselves  that  it 
belongs  also  to  science,  let  us  proceed  to  two  other  con- 
siderations. 

6. — The  Imagination  and  Our  Neighbor 

We  require  the  imagination  to  understand  the  Golden 
Rule.  The  Golden  Rule  is  a  constant  demand  upon  the 
imagination.  It  is  a  reminder  that  you  are  to  stir  up  that 
gift  within  you  before  you  pass  judgment  on  your 
brother.  It  is  a  command  to  use  the  imagination  in 
matters  of  the  judgment.  "Put  yourself  in  his  place"  is 
the  fairest  rule  that  can  be  given  to  a  man  who  must 
judge  the  motives  of  his  fellow  men.  And  how  shall  you 
put  yourself  in  his  place,  without  the  imagination? 

How  shall  we  make  our  appeals  for  charity  save 
through  the  imagination? 

We  read  that  three  hundred  miners  have  lost  their 
lives  in  a  disaster  in  a  mine,  and  we  are  not  moved.  But 
'.some  one  who  has  visited  Cherry  tells  us  about  it  so 
-vividly  that  we  see  it  all,  the  long  rows  of  houses  and  not 

46 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

a  man  in  a  whole  row ;  the  women  sobbing  about  the 
mouth  of  the  sealed  shaft;  the  miners  keeping  up  their 
courage  by  song  and  prayer;  the  little  church,  and  the 
faithful  minister  and  nurse,  and  we  see  it  all,  and  live  it 
all,  and  we  send  a  thousand  dollars  to  Cherry. 

7. — The  Imagination  and  the  Life  to  Come 

We  need  the  imagination  to  prepare  for  heaven. 

Is  there  a  life  beyond  the  grave?  The  man  of  sense 
and  of  sense  alone,  sees  dust  return  to  dust,  and  answers, 
"Death  ends  all."  But  life  itself  makes  a  tremendous  de- 
mand on  the  imagination.  Our  present  life  is  strange  and 
wonderful  past  all  belief.  It  requires  imagination  to  ac- 
count for  the  present  union  of  matter  and  spirit  in  these 
bodies  of  ours,  for  who  understands  it?  And  why  should 
it  be  thought  a  thing  incredible  that  God  should  raise  the 
dead  ? 

And  when  we  come  to  believe  in  heaven,  we  still  have 
every  appeal  to  the  imagination  in  making  our  belief 
a  motive  in  righteousness.  So  the  Bible  tells  us  in 
material  figures  a  few  things  that  furnish  material  for 
the  imagination.  The  gates  of  pearl,  the  streets  of  gold, 
the  ever-blooming  flowers  and  the  trees  bearing  fruit  all 
the  year,  the  nightless  day,  and  the  unending  song — 
these  are  the  raw  materials  for  the  sanctified  imagina- 
tion, to  help  us  to  make  real  to  the  soul  the  things  that 
eye  hath  not  seen,  nor  ear  heard,  neither  hath  entered 
into  the  heart  of  man. 

We  walk  by  sight,  but  not  wholly,  for  we  walk  by 
faith.  And  our  appeal  for  clean  streets,  for  righteous 
politics,  for  the  banishing  of  the  saloon,  for  the  uplifting 
of  mankind,  and  for  the  heaven  that  God  hath  prepared 

47 


RELIGIOUS  USES  OF  THE  IMAGINATION 

for  them  that  love  him,  is  an  appeal  to  that  sanctified 
imagination  which  fruits  in  faith. 

So  let  us  rejoice  in  the  glory  of  the  human  mind,  its 
power  to  know,  its  ability  to  love  and  rejoice,  and  its 
creative  strength  of  will.  And  with  it  all,  let  us  cultivate 
that  power  of  seeing  the  invisible,  of  forming  and 
cherishing  ideals,  and  of  framing  an  impelling  faith, 
through  the  enlightening  influence  of  that  great  gift  of 
God,  Avhich  gives  substance  to  things  hoped  for,  and 
affords  evidence  of  things  not  seen.  So  shall  we  add  our 
names  to  those  who  endure  as  seeing  Him  who  is  in- 
visible, and  share  in  the  triumph  of  faith. 

And  so  I  am  ready  to  meet  the  practical  man  who 
asks  if  religion  is  not  largel}^  concerned  with  the  imagina- 
tion, and  admit  to  him  that  it  is.  But  I  also  remind  him 
that  all  his  hope  for  the  betterment  of  human  life,  and 
all  his  inspiration  for  the  life  that  is  to  come,  necessitate 
an  appeal  to  the  imagination.  And  I  will  go  farther  and 
say  that  nowhere  is  that  appeal  more  sane  or  practical 
than  within  the  sphere  of  religion.  Whether  it  be  to 
make  real  my  brother's  hunger  to  the  practical  end  that 
he  may  share  my  loaf,  or  whether  it  be  that  the  soul 
shall  be  elevated  out  of  the  weary  round  of  the  common- 
place and  find  fellowship  with  the  hosts  immortal,  the 
appeal  is  to  the  imagination.  The  glorious  company  of 
the  apostles,  the  goodly  fellowship  of  the  prophets,  the 
noble  army  of  martyrs,  these  are  the  inspiring  com- 
panions of  the  man  with  the  sanctified  imagination.  On 
his  ears  fall  the  sweet  melodies  of  the  choir  invisible, 
and  his  solitary  race  in  the  lonely  .arena  is  cheered  by 
the  applause  of  the  cloud  of  witnesses.  And  he  endures 
as  seeing  Him  who  is  invisible. 

48 


Wf)t  ^robisal  fton  anb  tf)t  Atonement 


Son,  thou  art  ever  with  me,  and  all  that  I  have  is  thine. 
It  was  meet  that  we  should  make  merry  and  be  glad:  for  this 
thy  brother  was  dead,  and  is  alive  again;  and  was  lost,  and  is 
found.     Luke  15:31-32. 

Sir  Arthur  Sullivan's  oratorio  of  The  Prodigal  Son 
ends  with  the  return  of  the  wayward  boy,  and  his  wel- 
come to  the  father's  house.  That  is  where  the  parable 
ends  for  the  most  of  us.  I  presume  the  composer  of 
the  oratorio  never  considered  the  question  of  adding  the 
other  scene.  I  imagine  if  he  had  been  asked  to  do  so  he 
would  have  answered  that  the  result  would  be  an  inev- 
itable anti-climax.  Partly  I  sympathize  with  him.  I 
have  been  preaching  to  you  through  this  Lenten  season 
a  series  of  sermons  on  the  great  doctrines  of  the  Church, 
based  on  the  teachings  of  this  parable.  If  I  were  seeking 
merely  an  oratorical  climax  I  would  not  seek  to  add  a 
sermon  to  those  that  you  have  heard  already.  I  would 
end  the  series  with  the  echoes  of  the  song  and  the  dan- 
cing in  our  ears.  I  would  not  risk  the  possible  anti- 
climax of  another  scene  that  opens  dark  with  the  frown 
of  the  elder  brother. 

But  the  parable  is  not  complete  without  it.  Nay,  I 
believe  that  just  here  by  implication  are  found  those  ele- 
ments which  men  are  accustomed  to  say  the  parable  does 
not  contain.  And  as  each  of  the  preceding  sermons  has 
related  itself  to  a  doctrinal  theme,  I  intend  before  we 
are  through  to  say  something  about  the  doctrine  of  the 
atonement  as  it  is  implied  in  this  parable.     But  first  I 

49 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

want  to  fit  it  to  what  we  have  been  thinking  in  the  ser- 
mons that  have  gone  before. 

Everybody  knows  that  this  part  of  the  parable  is  neg- 
lected. Everybody  feels  that  the  doctrine  of  the  atone- 
ment ought  somehow  to  find  expression  in  the  parable. 
What  then  if  we  should  find  the  missing  doctrine  in  the 
neglected  part  of  the  parable? 

I  am  not  without  sympathy  for  the  elder  brother.  To 
stay  at  home,  to  be  true  to  one's  own  family,  to  pay  one's 
honest  debts,  to  keep  out  of  jail  and  out  of  the  poor 
house,  are  virtues  that  we  cannot  afford  to  despise.  And 
the  elder  brother's  problem  is  complicated  because  the 
prodigal  has  come  to  assume  that  repentance  carries  with 
it  some  claim  upon  the  robe  and  the  feast.  The  elder 
brother  is  willing,  sometimes,  to  help  the  prodigal  to 
where  he  may  array  himself  in  the  righteousness  of  the 
Father's  best  robe ;  but  the  prodigal  wants  an  old  coat 
which  he  can  pawn  for  beer ;  the  elder  brother  is  willing, 
sometimes,  to  see  the  fatted  calf  killed;  but  the  prodigal 
wants  a  lunch  ticket  which  is  negotiable  over  the  bar. 
All  these  experiences  give  the  elder  brother  some  ground 
for  complaint.  He  sees  his  tax  list  swelling,  and  finds 
the  prodigal  well  cared  for  in  hospitals  which  he  endows, 
in  charitable  institutions  to  which  he  is  an  annual  sub- 
scriber, or  in  jails  for  which  he  is  taxed.  All  this  the 
elder  brother  has  experienced  again  and  again,  and  he 
has  become  conservative.  We  cannot  bring  a  railing  ac- 
cusation against  him. 

I  do  not  know  what  the  prodigal  says  when  he 
comes  into  the  office  of  a  business  man.  But  I  can  tell 
you  that  one  of  the  most  trying  features  of  his  appeal  to 
a  minister  is  a  certain  arrogant  assumption  that  the  ring 

50 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

and  the  robe  belong  to  him ;  that  he  deserves  to  be  trust- 
ed because  he  has  proved  untrustworthy;  that  he  has 
right  by  reason  of  his  very  depravity  to  demand  some- 
thing better  than  the  opportunity  that  belongs  to  an 
honest  man.  These  features  which  I  find  constantly  in 
my  dealing  with  prodigals  give  me  a  large  measure  of 
sympathy  with  the  elder  brother. 

And  yet  the  elder  son  is  held  up  to  our  sure  and 
righteous  condemnation.  We  may  not  always  analyze 
it  correctly,  but  we  know  he  is  in  the  wrong.  Listen  to 
the  words  in  which  he  seeks  to  condemn  the  father,  but 
really  condemns  himself: 

"Lo,  these  many  years  do  I  serve  thee,  neither  trans- 
gressed I  at  any  time  thy  commandment ;  but  as  soon 
as  this  thy  son  was  come — " 

That  was  where  his  virtue  broke  down. 

And  now  we  strike  an  interesting  and  important  rev- 
elation. The  man  who  had  been  faithful  in  his  duties 
to  his  father  failed  in  his  duty  to  his  brether.  In  a  recent 
volume  Rev.  G.  A.  Morrison  reminds  us  that  the  elder 
brother  is  not  charged  with  wronging  the  servants,  and 
it  is  expressly  said  that  he  was  faithful  to  his  father ;  but 
he  failed  in  his  duty  to  his  brother. 

It  would  not  be  so  hard  to  do  our  duty  to  God,  if 
that  could  be  separated  from  our  duty  to  men.  It  is 
very  simple  to  read  the  Bible,  recite  creeds,  and  ofifer 
prayers;  but  the  difficult  part  of  religion  is  to  apply  our 
faith  to  life.  For  the  elder  son  to  be  dutiful  to  the 
father  and  considerate  of  the  servants  was  well  enough 
as  far  as  it  went,  but  it  was  not  all.  It  is  easier  to  be 
good  to  those  above  us  and  to  those  below  us,  but  hard 
to  be  just  to  our  equals. 

51 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

Did  you  ever  have  a  visit  from  a  friend  from  the 
country,  and  try  to  make  it  pleasant  for  him?  Did  you 
realize  how  hard  it  was  to  keep  from  being  a  snob?  You 
showed  him  over  your  house  with  its  steam  heat  and  its 
porcelain  bath  tubs,  and  you  took  him  to  dine  with  you 
at  the  club,  and  you  showed  him  the  city;  and  he  went 
back  and  told  his  friends  that  you  were  a  great  man  in 
Chicago,  prospering,  and  not  at  all  spoiled  by  your  pros- 
perity. But  now  I  will  tell  you  what  he  did  not  sus- 
pect, and  that  is  much  to  your  credit.  Every  five  min- 
utes you  had  to  check  yourself  from  the  uprising  spirit  of 
the  snob.  You  hated  yourself  for  it;  you  did  not  let  it 
conquer  you ;  but  you  were  surprised  and  ashamed  to 
find  how  easy  it  was  to  be  proud  and  patronizing  to  your 
old  friend.  If  you  made  him  feel  at  home  in  your  house, 
and  sent  him  back  the  happier  because  he  had  seen  your 
prosperity,  you  did  a  difficult  and  tactful  thing,  and  you 
deserve  his  good  opinion  of  you. 

What  bitter  things  one  may  hear  about  physicians 
from  physicians ;  about  artists  from  artists ;  about  law- 
yers from  lawyers.  And  sometimes  ministers  are  not  the 
most  charitable  judges  of  their  brethren  in  the  ministry. 

Do  you  think  it  strange?  Here  is  an  artist  who  for 
years  has  toiled  laboriously  at  his  art,  and  with  a  plod- 
ding measure  of  success.  He  has  attained  to  the  distinc- 
tion of  having  his  pictures  hung  at  exhibitions ;  and  now 
and  then  has  been  able  to  sell  one  at  a  price  sufficient 
to  reward  him  reasonably  well.  Now  up  from  the  ranks 
of  the  imknown  comes  a  new  artist,  and  suddenly  his 
name  is  in  all  the  art  journals.  People  flock  to  see  his 
canvases,  talk  about  his  shadows,  his  technique,  his 
genius,  and  pay  for  his  picture  at  the  rate  of  hundreds  of 

52 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

dollars  a  square  foot.  And  his  fellow  artist  thinks  he 
sees  through  his  little  trick  of  spreading  paint.  The  pic- 
tures have  a  certain  merit,  he  will  concede,  but  nothing 
in  proportion  to  what  the  public  thinks  it  sees  in  them. 
And  the  other  artist,  shivering  in  his  studio  over  can- 
vases that  he  may  never  sell,  cries  out  to  the  public, 
"Lo,  these  many  years  do  I  serve  thee;  and  always  have 
I  done  good  work;  and  I  have  barely  a  living  to  show 
for  it.  But  as  soon  as  this  freak  had  come,  who  violates 
every  rule  of  art,  thou  hast  given  him  the  medal  and  the 
gold  coin !" 

Here  is  a  physician  who  has  made  faithful  prepara- 
tion for  his  work,  and  has  gained  the  confidence  of  a 
small  but  increasing  number  of  patients.  He  seems  in 
sight  of  a  modest  and  not  unreasonable  income.  Sudden- 
ly there  comes  to  town  a  new  doctor,  and  hangs  out  a 
little  brighter  shingle;  and  the  success  of  his  phenomenal 
cures  is  buzzed  about  where  people  talk  over  their  com- 
plaints. One  woman  says  to  another,  "Why  don't  you 
try  Dr.  Newcomer?  I  am  sure  he  could  help  you,"  and 
she  leaves  the  man  she  has  learned  to  trust,  and  goes  to 
the  stranger.  The  old  doctor,  driving  by  in  his  one-horse 
buggy,  sees  the  new  doctor's  automobile  at  the  door  of 
his  former  patient,  and  cries  out  within  his  soul,  "Lo, 
these  many  years  have  I  served  that  family,  from  the 
cradle  to  the  grave ;  and  I  thought  I  had  won  their  grat- 
itude ;  but  as  soon  as  this  quack  has  come,  whose  chief 
qualification  is  his  use  of  more  gasoline  than  I,  they  have 
given  him  the  place  which  I  had  rightly  earned." 

What  we  call  professional  jealousy  is  not  wholly  un- 
reasonable. It  is  the  angry  protest  of  the  elder  son 
against  the  awarding  of  the  ring  and  the  robe  on  other 

53 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

grounds  than  those  of  merit.  The  world  in  its  charity 
for  the  prodigal  and  its  fondness  for  new  sensations  has 
given  its  jewelry  and  its  raiment  with  quite  sufficient  dis- 
regard for  the  man  who  has  put  hard  work  into  his  craft. 

It  is  because  it  is  so  difficult  as  to  be  almost  impossi- 
ble for  us  rightly  to  adjust  the  status  of  the  prodigal  in 
his  relations  with  the  elder  brother  that  we  eliminate  this 
part  of  the  story.  And  it  is  precisely  at  this  point  that 
religion  becomes  difficult. 

David  has  been  much  commended  because  he  said, 
"Against  Thee,  Thee  only  have  I  sinned."  Men  have 
counted  it  the  perfection  of  his  repentance  that  his  vision 
of  the  magnitude  of  his  sin  against  God  prevented  his 
thinking  of  the  home  he  had  ruined  and  the  man  he  had 
murdered.  I  do  not  think  the  prophet  Nathan  would 
have  agreed  with  these  admirers.  He  said  little  about 
God,  but  told  David  that  he  was  as  contemptible  as  a 
sheep-thief  by  reason  of  his  sin  against  his  fellow  man. 

It  is  easy  to  confess  your  sin  before  God,  but  it  is 
very  hard  to  confess  it  to  your  brother,  Jesus  tells  us 
that  confession  to  the  brother  must  come  first.  "If  there- 
fore thou  art  ofifering  thy  gift  at  the  altar,  and  there  re- 
memberest  that  thy  brother  hath  aught  against  thee, 
leave  there  thy  gift  before  the  altar,  and  go  thy  way; 
first  be  reconciled  to  thy  brother,  and  then  come  and 
ofTer  thy  gift"  (Matthew  5:24).  It  is  not  so  hard  for 
Jacob  to  wrestle  with  the  angel  as  to  meet  the  wronged 
and  wrathful  Esau ;  but  not  till  he  is  willing  to  meet  his 
brother  has  he  prevailed  with  God. 

The  Christian  religion  is  the  most  natural  and  the 
easiest  religion  on  earth,  in  all  respects  but  one.  In  that 
one  it  is  the  hardest;  namely  in  that  our  duty  to  God  at 

54 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

every  point  must  square  itself  with  our  duty  to  our 
brother.  "If  any  man  say,  I  love  God,  and  hate  his 
brother,  he  is  a  liar;  for  he  that  loveth  not  his  brother 
whom  he  hath  seen,  how  can  he  love  God  whom  he  hath 
not  seen?  And  this  commandment  have  we  from  Him, 
that  he  that  loveth  God  love  his  brother  also."  (I  John 
4:20-21). 

If  we  have  made  any  mistake  here  it  is  in  assuming 
that  love  to  God  is  so  much  more  important  than  love  to 
man  that  we  have  forgotten  that  the  two  are  inseparable. 
That  is  uncomfortable  for  us  all.  It  would  be  so  much 
easier  to  love  God  if  we  were  at  liberty  to  neglect  our 
brother.  It  is  in  our  dealings  with  our  brother  that  we 
show  the  weakness  of  our  love  to  God. 

We  are  celebrating  the  week  of  our  Lord's  Passion. 
And  we  are  remembering  how  Jesus  suffered  at  the 
hands  of  sinful  men.  But  it  is  definitely  on  record  that 
if  they  had  known  who  He  was  they  would  not  have 
crucified  the  Lord  of  Glory.  Why  then  did  God  send 
Him  to  be  crucified? 

Have  we  not  here  the  very  secret  of  the  Incarnation? 
God  reveals  himself  in  such  form  that  we  may  prove  our 
loyalty  to  the  Father  by  our  reception  of  the  Elder 
Brother,  God  is  not  content  with  our  loyalty  to  Him, 
as  God,  but  insists  that  we  shall  prove  it  by  our  faithful- 
ness to  God  revealed  as  our  fellow  men. 

"Art  thou  a  king?"  Jesus  claimed  none  of  the  exemp- 
tions due  him.  Pilate  and  the  high  priest  must  deal  with 
him  as  a  man  and  a  private  citizen,  a  lay  preacher  from 
Galilee. 

Nor  is  there  anything  strange  and  exceptional  in  that 
test.     In  the  incarnation   God  meets  us  on  the  human 

55 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

level,  that  we  may  learn  this  hardest  and  most  important 
of  the  lessons  of  our  practical  religion.  As  we  deal  with 
our  Elder  Brother  so  deal  we  with  the  Father ;  and 
what  we  do  tp  the  least  of  these  our  brethren,  we  do 
to  Him. 

Our  theories  of  salvation  are  defective  because  they 
are  not  social.  We  eliminate  from  our  thought  the 
elder  brother  and  the  community  of  the  home  life  and 
think  only  of  the  prodigal  and  the  Father.  God,  who 
saves  men,  saves  them  to  something,  which  something 
is  not  realized  without  a  society  of  efifort.  One  man  is 
sufficient,  thank  God,  for  a  man's  work ;  yet  where  one 
chases  a  thousand,  two  can  put  ten  thousand  to  flight. 
The  plan  of  God  involves  the  uniting  of  Father  and  elder 
brother  and  younger  brother  in  a  holy  bond  wherein  the 
unwasted  wealth  of  the  elder  brother  shall  keep  the  prod- 
igal, and  even  the  prodigal's  sad  experience  shall  have  a 
moral  value  in  developing  the  energies  and  sympathies 
of  the  more  favored  children  of  God. 

The  younger  brother  needs  the  elder  brother's  help. 
There  are  some  men  whom  the  love  of  God  will  not 
bring  back  so  long  as  the  elder  brother  stands  scowling 
in  the  door,  or  sits  content  in  the  end  of  his  pew  and  tells 
the  usher  to  seat  the  prodigal  in  the  gallery.  There  are 
prodigals  who  have  gone  back  to  the  far  country  and 
the  swine  because  they  got  near  enough  to  the  Father's 
house  to  see  his  elder  brother,  self  righteous  and  indiflfer- 
ent,  or  complacently  censorious,  and  they  would  not  in- 
trude where  they  were  not  welcome.  There  are  whole 
regiments  of  men  who  march  past  the  church  with  din- 
ner pails  six  days  in  the  week,  and  on  the  seventh  go  to 
the  ball  game  or  the  saloon,  or  God  knows  where.  Where 

56 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

is  their  elder  brother  who  has  received  so  much  of  what 
belongs  to  the  Father?  Is  he  unwilling  to  share  it  with 
the  unclean  and  unstable  prodigal? 

But  the  elder  son  needs  the  younger.  His  hardness  of 
heart  shows  him  a  stranger  to  sympathy.  He  enjoys  too 
good  health  to  be  sympathetic  with  weakness ;  he  is  too 
clean  to  be  patient  with  dirt;  he  has  seen  too  little  of 
temptation  to  know  how  to  pity  men  who  struggle 
against  it.  And  hence  he,  as  truly  as  the  prodigal,  is  un- 
developed in  his  finer  qualities.  The  return  of  the  prod- 
igal will  be  a  blessing  to  the  elder  brother.  It  will  try 
his  patience  often,  and  humble  his  pride  and  cause  him 
anxiety;  sometimes  the  elder  son  may  almost  wish  that 
the  younger  one  had  never  come  home  to  disgrace  the 
family.  But  the  elder  son  will  grow  in  grace  by  reason 
of  the  experience. 

It  is  commonly  admitted  that  parents  are  desirable 
for  children;  but  I  have  learned  that  children  are  still 
more  necessary  to  parents.  I  have  always  believed  that 
the  younger  brother  needed  the  elder ;  I  am  learning  that 
the  elder  needs  the  younger.  Were  there  no  weakness  the 
strong  could  learn  no  sympathy ;  were  there  no  ignorance 
the  learned  would  grow  arrogant ;  were  there  no  poverty 
the  rich  would  grow  proud.  It  is  God's  will  that  the 
strong  shall  bear  the  infirmities  of  the  weak,  and  not 
please  themselves ;  that  the  rich  shall  give  to  help  the 
poor,  and  so  lay  up  treasure  in  heaven ;  that  the  wise 
shall  instruct  the  unlearned,  and  so  themselves  become 
wise  unto  salvation.  The  prodigal  himself  becomes  a 
helper,  bringing  out  his  brother's  latent  virtues,  though 
sometimes  by  counter  irritation. 

It  must  not  be  assumed  that  the  forgiving  of  the  prod- 

57 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

igal  made  the  father  poorer,  or  permanently  diminished 
the  resources  of  the  elder  brother.  It  is  only  temporarily 
that  Christ  is  made  poor  for  the  sinner's  sake;  for  this 
very  reason  God  hath  highly  exalted  Him;  and  as  for 
his  patrimony,  we  have  nothing  better  promised  than 
that  we  shall  be  joint  heirs  with  Christ. 

When  the  prodigal  is  forgiven,  he  ceases  to  be  a 
waster;  he  becomes  a  producer.  Even  God  is  richer 
when  a  repentant  soul  comes  back.  Sin  is  waste;  it  is 
sin,  not  forgiveness,  that  diminishes  God's  wealth.  Noth- 
ing makes  God  so  rich  as  his  giving,  and  his  forgiving 
adds  eternally  to  his  glory. 

It  has  been  noted  by  all  commentators  that  the  Para- 
ble of  the  Prodigal  Son  contains  no  doctrine  of  a  sub- 
stitutionary atonement.  It  is  very  common  to  say  in  what 
passes  for  explanation,  "Jesus  did  not  intend  to  teach  all 
doctrine  in  one  parable."  But  to  this  are  two  answers : 
first,  that  Jesus  certainly  did  mean  to  teach  the  way  in 
which  an  erring  soul  comes  back  to  God;  and  secondly, 
that  the  kind  of  doctrine  which  sometimes  has  called 
itself,  though  without  the  slightest  right,  the  orthodox 
doctrine,  not  only  is  not  in  the  parable,  but  that  no  possi- 
ble room  can  be  made  there  for  it. 

If  Jesus  had  believed  that  the  only  sanctions  of  the 
moral  law  are  penal,  and  that  God  cannot  forgive  with- 
out punishing  (which  would  be  the  same  as  to  say  that 
God  cannot  forgive  at  all)  he  could  easily  have  put  that 
doctrine  into  the  parable ;  the  father  could  have  whipped 
the  elder  son  before  he  forgave  the  younger.  The  only 
reason  Jesus  did  not  put  that  kind  of  atonement  into  the 
parable  was  that  he  did  not  believe  it.  Any  theory  of 
that  character  is  incredible,  and  opposed  to  the  whole 

58 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

method  of  Jesus  and  the  spirit  of  the  God  of  the  Gospels. 

And  yet  there  is  an  implication  of  such  a  doctrine,  if 
only  by  contrast.  It  was  because  the  character  of  those 
whom  Jesus  addressed  required  the  rebuke  implied  in  the 
story  of  the  elder  brother  that  Jesus  could  not  put  into 
the  parable  a  likeness  of  himself.  Had  the  elder  brother 
been  as  much  like  Jesus  as  the  father  was  like  God,  the 
parable  would  have  been  different  in  just  one,  and  that 
a  very  important,  particular.  It  was  because  the  elder 
brother  was  un-Christlike  that  the  father  had  no  messen- 
ger to  the  far  country,  and  the  prodigal  had  to  find  his 
way  back  alone. 

The  most  pronounced  suggestion  of  the  relation  of 
Christ  to  the  returning  sinner  is  shown  in  what  we  in- 
stinctively look  for  and  find  lacking  in  the  story  of  the 
elder  brother.  How  readily  does  this  brother  impute  to 
the  returned  prodigal  the  sins  which  are  common  to  prod- 
igals. Whether  they  were  really  his  or  not  we  do  not 
know ;  very  likely  they  were.  But  our  Elder  Brother  ex- 
hibits the  mind  of  the  Father,  not  imputing  even  our  own 
trespasses  to  us.  (2  Cor.  5:19).  The  elder  brother  in 
the  parable  harbors  the  memories  of  the  sinner's  mis- 
spent years ;  but  our  Elder  Brother  says :  "Go  and  sin 
no  more."  The  elder  brother  in  the  parable  is  sullen  and 
self-righteous ;  our  Elder  Brother  is  merciful  and  gra- 
cious, and  His  righteousness  is  a  mantle  of  charity  to  cover 
the  sins  of  the  world.  The  elder  brother  in  the  parable 
has  spent  his  life  with  the  father  and  never  has  learned 
the  father's  spirit ;  but  our  Elder  Brother  is  one  with  the 
Father  in  the  gracious  work  of  reconciliation.  The  elder 
brother  in  the  parable  was  angry  and  would  not  come  in 
to  the  feast;  our  Elder  Brother  comes  out  to  meet  and 

59 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

welcome  the  returning  sinner.  The  elder  brother  in  the 
parable  hoards  that  which  he  and  the  father  have  accu- 
mulated, selfishly  reckons  on  the  fruits  of  his  own  indus- 
try and  economy;  but  our  Elder  Brother  grasped  not  at 
His  own  possession  in  the  Divine  Nature,  but  impover- 
ished Himself  that  we  through  His  poverty  might  be 
rich. 

We  are  far  wrong  if  we  say  that  this  parable  has  no  doc- 
trine of  vicarious  sacrifice.  On  the  contrary  it  iriustrates 
the  eternal  necessity  of  such  sacrifice.  The  heart  hunger 
for  such  a  doctrine  and  the  disappointment  that  the  elder 
brother  here  proved  incapable  of  it,  account  for  the  fre- 
quent omission  of  this  part  of  the  parable  from  our  pub- 
lic reading.  The  heart  of  the  Gospel  is  in  another  para- 
ble, which  is  the  life  of  Christ  itself.  In  Him  we  see  a 
Divine  Son  making  effective  the  Father's  forgiveness  by 
His  own  gracious  and  vicarious  work  for  sinful  men. 

Christ  is  "the  Way"  by  which  the  soul  returns  to  God. 
He  is  not  in  the  way.  He  is  the  ladder  which  God  lets 
down  beside  the  wanderer's  stony  pillow,  and  by  which 
God's  messages  of  love  descend  and  the  wanderer's  as- 
pirations rise  to  God :  He  is  not  a  barrier  between  the 
soul  and  God.  To  come  to  God  in  Christ  is  to  come  in 
the  easy,  the  natural,  the  all-inclusive  way.  A  man  need 
not  strain  his  faith  in  an  effort  to  compel  himself  to  come 
to  God  through  Christ.  He  who  truly  comes  cannot 
come  amiss.  The  man  who  accepts  the  Father's  pardon- 
ing love,  and  in  all  sincerity  commits  his  life  to  God, 
need  not  disturb  himself  because  he  does  not  see  clearly 
how  his  coming  to  the  Father  is  through  Christ.  He  who 
is  truly  God's  child  is  Christ's  brother,  an  heir  of  God, 
and  joint  heir  with  Jesus  Christ. 

60 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

There  is  nothing  artificial  or  arbitrary  in  this.  My- 
self, my  brother  and  my  God,  these  three  enter  into  the 
very  structure  of  the  Christian  faith.  It  would  not  be 
enough  that  the  parable  should  take  the  prodigal  home, 
and  reconcile  him  to  the  Father;  for  the  relationship  of 
every  man  to  God  involves  a  relationship  with  his  fellow 
man.  It  is  most  logical,  most  true  to  life,  that  the  para- 
ble should  bring  us  face  to  face  with  what  was  lacking, 
in  that  home,  that  in  its  lack  we  may  understand  the  mis- 
sion of  Jesus  Christ,  the  well-beloved  Son,  by  whose 
coming  and  sacrifice  we  are  reconciled  to  his  Father  and 
our  Father,  his  God  and  our  God. 

"Lord,  show  us  the  Father,  and  it  sufficeth  us."  Al- 
most. Not  quite.  We  want  the  human  element  in  God; 
Brotherhood  as  well  as  Fatherhood.  We  cry  with 
Browning  in  his  Saul  for, — 

"A  Face  like  my  face  that  receives  thee;  a  man  like  to  me 
Thou  shalt  love  and  be  loved  by  forever;  a  hand  like  this  hand 
Shall  throw  open  the  gate  of  new  life  to  thee;  see  the  Christ  stand!" 

If  only  the  elder  son  in  the  Parable  had  been  like 
God's  well  beloved  Son,  the  parable  would  have  required 
very  little  changing,  the  mere  reading  into  it  of  a  few  of 
the  abundant  words  of  Scripture  concerning  the  redemp- 
tive ministry  of  Jesus;  but  how  wonderful  would  have 
been  the  change!  For  really,  when  we  read  into  this 
parable  the  contrast  which  it  inevitably  suggests,  what 
is  this  parable  but  the  story  of  the  redeeming  love  of 
God,  set  forth  in  the  ministry  of  Jesus  Christ? 

Now  I  will  tell  you  what  God  is  like,  and  I  will  tell 
you  what  Jesus  Christ  is  like. 

A  certain  man  had  two  sons:  and  the  younger  of  them 
said  to  his  father,  "Father,  give  me  the  portion  of  thy  sub- 

61 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

stance  that  falleth  to  me."  And  he  divided  unto  them  his 
living.  And  not  many  days  after  the  younger  son  gath- 
ered all  together,  and  took  his  journey  into  a  far  country ; 
and  there  he  wasted  his  substance  with  riotous  living. 
And  when  he  had  spent  all,  there  arose  a  mighty  famine 
in  that  country:  and  he  began  to  be  in  want.  And  he 
went  and  joined  himself  to  one  of  the  citizens  of  that 
country;  and  he  sent  him  into  his  fields  to  feed  the  swine. 
And  he  would  fain  have  been  filled  with  the  husks  that 
the  swine  did  eat:  and  no  man  gave  unto  him. 

But  one  day  as  he  sat  there  amid  the  swine,  there 
came  to  him  a  man  whom  he  almost  recognized,  and 
whose  face  was  like  his  own  yet  most  unlike,  who  re- 
called to  him,  though  dimly,  his  faded  memories  of  better 
things,  and  he  said  to  him,  "How  many  hired  servants  of 
thy  father's  have  bread  enough  and  to  spare,  and  thou 
dost  perish  with  hunger !" 

And  he  replied,  "Yes,  but  I  have  sinned  against  heaven 
and  my  father,  and  am  no  more  worthy  to  be  called  his 
son !" 

"Nevertheless,"  said  the  stranger,  "Thy  father  is  rich 
in  mercy ;  come ;  rise,  and  go  to  thy  father,  and  lo,  I  will 
go  with  thee !" 

And  he  arose,  and  went  to  his  father,  the  stranger 
helping  him,  and  the  prodigal  kept  saying,  as  he  limped 
along,  "He  will  make  me  as  one  of  his  hired  servants !" 

But  while  he  was  yet  afar  ofif,  his  father  saw  him,  and 
was  moved  with  compassion, and  ran, and  fell  on  his  neck, 
and  kissed  him.  And  the  son  said  unto  him,  "Father,  1 
have  sinned  against  heaven,  and  in  thy  sight :  I  am  no 
more  worthy  to  be  called  thy  son."  But  the  father  said  to 
his  servants,  "Bring  forth  quickly  the  best  robe,  and  put 

62 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

it  on  him ;  and  put  a  ring  on  his  hand,  and  shoes  on  his 
feet :  and  bring-  the  fatted  calf,  and  kill  it,  and  let  us  eat, 
and  make  merry:  for  this  my  son  was  dead,  and  is  alive 
again ;  he  was  lost,  and  is  found."  And  they  began  to  be 
merry. 

And  there  was  one  who  led  the  rejoicing,  and  the 
prodigal  knew  him,  for  he  it  was  that  had  brought  him 
home,  and  behold,  it  was  the  elder  brother,  who  had 
gone  to  the  far  country  to  find  him  that  had  gone  astray, 
and  bring  him  home  again. 

And  the  father  said  to  the  elder  son,  ''Son,  thou  art 
always  with  me,  and  all  thkt  I  have  is  thine." 

And  the  elder  son  said  to  the  father,  "Father,  I  will 
that  this  my  brother  be  with  me  where  I  am;  for  all 
things  that  I  have  received  from  thee,  I  would  share  with 
ni}'  brother." 

And  the  father  said,  "Let  it  be  so." 

And  the  elder  son  to  the  younger,  "All  things  are 
given  me  of  my  father;  all  the  glory  that  the  father  hath 
bestowed  on  me,  I  have  given  unto  thee,  that  we  may  be 
united,  even  as  the  father  and  I  are  united,  that  we  may 
all  be  made  perfect  in  our  united  love,  and  that  the  world 
may  know  that  the  father  sent  me,  and  that  he  has  loved 
thee,  even  as  he  loved  me." 

But  even  this  would  not  tell  the  whole  story  of  the 
love  of  Christ.  For  the  younger  brother  learned  that  the 
elder  brother  on  his  way  to  the  far  country,  fell  in  with 
other  prodigals  in  their  carousal ;  and  because  he  would 
not  join  with  them,  but  rebuked  them  for  their  sins,  they 
hated  him,  and  struck  him,  and  wounded  him,  and  cast 
him  into  a  pit,  and  thought  they  had  killed  him.  But 
this  did  not  deter  him,  but  he  rose  up  and  went  on,  in 

63 


THE  PRODIGAL  SON  AND  THE  ATONEMENT 

pain,  but  with  heroic  courage,  until  he  found  his  brother. 

And  when  the  younger  brother  knew  this,  he  cried, 
"O  my  brother,  this  was  the  love  I  sinned  against,  thy 
love  and  the  father's !  I  can  never  be  worthy  of  it,  nor 
have  I  any  worth  to  plead  for  my  welcome !  Thou  hast 
been  wounded  for  my  transgressions;  thou  hast  been 
bruised  for  my  iniquities;  the  chastisement  of  my  peace 
was  upon  thee;  and  with  thy  stripes  have  I  been  healed !" 

All  this  is  really  in  the  parable,  for  it  is  the  contrast 
of  that  type  of  righteousness  which  saved  itself  with  that 
which  gives  itself  in  self-sacrifice  for  the  salvation  of  the 
world.  It  is  the  contrast  of  self-seeking  rectitude  with 
the  sacrificial  righteousness  which  makes  for  the  at-one- 
ment  of  God  and  sinful  men.  And  that  is  why  we  must 
never  say  again  that  the  parable  of  the  Prodigal  Son 
contains  no  doctrine  of  the  atonement. 


64 


ST.  PAUL  AS  AN   EVOLUTIONIST 

For  the  creation  was  subjected  unto  vanity,  not  of  its 
own  will,  but  b}^  reason  of  him  who  subjected  it,  in  hope 
that  the  creation  itself  also  shall  be  delivered  from  the 
bondage  of  corruption,  into  the  liberty  of  the  glory  of  the 
children  of  God.     Romans  8:20-21. 

It  is  said  to  be  an  ill  wind  that  blows  naebody  guid ; 
but  there  appear  to  be  such  winds.  And  for  some  of 
them  we  cannot  justly  blame  either  ourselves  or  our 
neighbors.  Neither  did  this  man  sin  nor  his  parents,  yet 
he  was  born  blind.  Neither  did  this  child  sin  nor  the 
doctor,  but  she  died,  and  the  next  week  the  medical  jour- 
nals announced  a  nev/  cure  for  that  very  disease.  It  is  a 
shallow  philosophy,  false  as  it  is  cruel,  that  attempts  to 
account  for  all  the  evil  of  the  v/orld  as  the  result  of  sin. 
When  we  deal  with  the  problems  which  this  situation 
involves,  we  face  the  enign"^  of  existence,  and  we  need  all 
the  wisdom  of  human  reason  and  of  divine  revelation. 
Not  to  the  problem  as  a  whole  do  I  invite  your  thought 
this  morning,  but  to  certain  phases  of  its  general  aspect 
as  these  appear  in  the  philosophy  of  Paul  in  the  passage 
from  which  I  have  chosen  this  text. 

LET  US  FACE  THE  FACTS  AS  THEY  ARE 
Paul  does  not  claim  that  all  is  riglit  with  himself;  he 
admits  the  contrary.  There  is  something  so  wrong  with 
himself  that  when  he  would  do  good  evil  is  present  with 
him.  But  Paul  claims  that  he  is  not  the  only  thing  in  the 
world   that   needs   to   be   changed.     The   world   itself  is 

65 


COSMIC      REDEMPTION 


subject  to  vanity,  by  which  he  means  instability,  unde- 
sirability. 

Not  every  spot  on  earth  has  a  perfectly  ideal  climate. 
Not  everywhere  and  always  does  it  rain  just  when  crops 
need  it  most.  Lightning  strikes,  and  sometimes  kills 
good  people.  Storms  beat,  and  that  upon  the  just  as 
well  as  the  unjust.  Good  people  sometimes  slip  on  icy 
places  and  break  bones.  Good  people  sometimes  suffer 
from  earthquakes  and  floods  and  unseasonable  frosts 
And  disease  and  death  are  undeniable  realities. 

There  are  several  ways  of  accounting  for  this  "vanity" 
of  nature.  One  is  to  deny  that  sickness,  death  and  pain 
exist.     That  is  simple,  but  every  one  knows  it  is  false. 

Another  explanation  is  that  the  earth  itself  is  all  that 
could  be  desired,  but  that  man  is  bad.  That,  too,  has 
the  virtue  of  simplicity,  and  gives  the  ground  of  an 
appeal  to  men  to  be  at  least  as  good  as  the  world  in 
which  they  live;  but  men  ought  to  be  better  than  their 
environment,  less  fickle  than  the  weather,  more  stable 
than  the  climate,  and  more  discriminately  just  and  man- 
ifestly kind  than  nature. 

There  is  another  explanation,  and  it  has  homiletic  value, 
namely,  that  everything  was  perfect  when  God  made  it, 
but  that  when  man  sinned,  he  carried  the  world  down 
with  him  under  the  condemnation  of  God.  But  we  lack  all 
proof  either  that  the  fall  of  man  has  changed  the  climate 
or  orbit  of  earth,  or  that  God's  method  is  to  make  things 
perfect  out  of  hand.  The  present  tendency  is  toward  the 
conviction  that  Paul  is  perfectly  right  in  saying  that  God 
makes  things  subject  to  "vanity."  It  may  seem  a  strange 
way  for  God  to  make  things  thus,  but  the  consensus  both 

66 


ST.     PAUL     AS     AN     EVOLUTIONIST 

of  scientists  and  theologians  is  that  this  is  the  way  God 
does  it. 

Let  us  face  the  fact  as  Paul  does,  that  the  world  we 
live  in  is  not  perfectly  ideal  in  every  particular.  Let  us 
admit  that  we  ourselves  are  less  than  ideal;  but  let  us 
not  blame  ourselves  for  God's  part  of  it.  Let  us  insist 
with  Paul  that  climate,  fatigue,  pain  and  death  are  not 
wholly  conditioned  on  the  moral  states  of  man,  and 
while  we  are  admitting,  let  us  admit  that  all  the  ex- 
planations above  fail  to  explain.  What  then?  Is  creation 
a  chaos? 

There  is  another  explanation.  It  is  Paul's  explanation, 
and  the  explanation  of  the  modern  mind, 

I  do  not  make  this  last  statement  lightly.  Nor  am  I 
asserting  more  than  is  true  of  the  Apostle  Paul.  I  have 
never  taught  or  believed  that  the  Bible  should  be  held  to 
teach  the  form  of  scientific  instruction  in  this  present  age, 
or  that  its  inspiration  should  be  judged  by  its  literal  con- 
formity to  current  scientific  opinion.  But  when  I  read 
the  works  of  modern  thinkers  I  turn  back  to  this  eighth 
chapter  of  Romans,  and  it  seems  to  me  the  profoundest 
piece  of  logic  in  all  the  literature  of  philosophy,  and 
needing  no  forcing  of  its  essential  thought  to  justify  the 
claim  that  it  is  essentially  modern  and  fundamentally 
scientific. 

Let  us  approach  the  explanation  of  the  imperfection 
of  ourselves  and  of  the  world,  and  particularly  now  of 
the  world,  as  nearly  as  we  may  from  the  standpoint  of 
Paul,  and  in  the  scientific  spirit.  There  are  certain  prop- 
ositions which  we  may  deduce  from  the  philosophy  of 
Paul. 

67 


COSMIC      REDEMPTION 


GOD  IS  IN  FULL  CONTROL  OF  THE  SITUATION 
At  the  close  of  each  creative  period  God  pronounced 
His  work  good.  At  the  end  He  called  it  very  good.  He 
has  never  called  it  perfect.  We  talk  of  the  "total  de- 
pravity of  inanimate  things,"  and  not  without  some  rea- 
son. Paul  tells  us  here  that  creation  has  been 
made  subject  to  vanity,  not  because  it  has  a  wicked 
will  of  its  own,  which  thwarts  God's  will,  but 
by  the  deliberate  will  of  God,  and  that  the  redemp- 
tion of  creation  from  this  subjection  to  vanity  is  a 
part  of  the  hope  of  the  universe.  We  are  living  still  in  the 
dawn  of  the  creation  Sabbath.  God  seems  to  be  resting 
from  His  labors,  but  really  the  Father  worketh  hitherto, 
and  our  work  is  a  part  of  His,  and  the  dew  is  still  on  the 
leaves.  This  is  Paul's  explanation  of  much  that  seems  to 
to  us  awry  in  the  universe.  It  is  awry,  he  says,  but  it  is 
not  completed.  It  was  made  subject  to  vanity,  instabil- 
ity, liability  to  decay  and  wrong  usage.  Nor  is  it  entirely 
of  its  own  perverseness  nor  yet  of  the  will  of  man  that  it 
is  so;  it  is  in  process  of  completion.  It  has  been  so  made 
by  a  conscious  act  of  God,  causing  it  intentional  subjuga- 
tion to  powers  from  which  it  is  yet  to  be  redeemed. 
God's  plan  is  to  be  judged,  not  alone  by  the  uncompleted 
work  which  is  now  seen,  but  more  by  the  final  redemp- 
tion of  all  that  He  has  made.  This  redemption  begins 
with  mankind,  and  through  the  revelation  of  our  divine 
sonship  is  to  be  wrought  the  redemption  of  creation  from 
the  bondage  of  corruption  into  the  liberty  of  our  own 
glory  as  the  children  of  God, 

That  is,  Paul  does  not  affirm  that  God  started  a  ma- 
chine which  He  has  permitted  to  get  beyond  his  control, 

68 


ST.     PAUL     AS     AN     EVOLUTIONIST 

and  that  He  is  now  desperately  pursuing  it  in  the  ahuost 
hopeless  effort  to  regain  it.  Paul  says  that  God  is  on  the 
throne,  and  ever  has  been.  This  is  a  tremendous  assump- 
tion, but  it  is  scientific.  Paul  says  the  creation,  that  is, 
the  world,  as  we  know  it,  is  unfinished ;  it  is  the 
germ  of  the  world  that  is  to  be.  It  is  coming  to  the 
birth.  The  past  is  pre-natal.  These  "vanities"  and  sins 
and  sorrows  are  the  birth-throes  of  God's  ultimate  pur- 
pose. There  is  to  be  a  delivering  of  the  creation,  a  cos- 
mic redemption. 

GOD  HAS  A  LOGICAL  PLAN  AND  METHOD 

If  we  are  sure  of  this,  it  is  no  small  gain.  The  method 
of  God  is  discernible  in  part,  and  very  perplexing  in  the 
the  parts  we  do  not  understand,  but  there  is  a  soul  in  the 
universe,  working  out  a  logical  result. 

Great  minds  have  sometimes  endeavored  to  reproduce 
the  sensation  which  an  intelligent  being  might  have  ex- 
perienced if  present  at  creation.  He  would  have  been 
filled  with  wonder  and  reverence  at  the  unfolding  of  the 
divine  plan — so  the}-  assume.  But  it  is  more  probable 
that  such  a  mind  would  have  been  completely  bewildered 
at  the  apparent  contradictions,  the  long  delays  when 
nothing  seemed  to  be  accomplished,  and  the  unnnml)ere<l 
centuries  in  which  the  work  of  creation  seemed  to  have 
been  abandoned  by  God  to  the  play  of  wild  and  conflict- 
ing forces.  At  infinite  cost  earth-crust  was  formed  to  1)C 
submerged  in  the  seething  caldron  of  eruption  and  up- 
heaval. Beds  of  rock  which  took  centuries  to  form  disap- 
peared from  sight  in  a  single  subsidence.  Spots  that 
seemed  preparing  for  an  Eden  were  engulfed  in  a  deluge 
when  the  fountains  of  the  great  deep  were  brokctt  up. 

69 


COSMIC      REDEMPTION 


Forests  grew  for  ages  to  be  buried  beneath  sand  which 
hardened  into  rock,  and  the  loss  seemed  irreparable  and 
inexplicable.  We  could  not  have  understood  it  haa  we 
seen  it  in  progress.  Hence,  I  say,  there  has  been  vast  gain 
that  the  progress  of  creation,  still  incomplete,  may  now 
be  discerned;  that  an  end,  a  purpose,  or  a  series  of  pur- 
poses, may  now  be  discovered  by  an  intelligent  mind. 

Prof.  X.  S.  Shaler,  in  "The  Interpretation  of  Nature,'" 
says  that  there  has  been  a  perceptible  progress  among 
scientists  in  the  recognition  of  purpose  in  creation.  "In 
the  study  of  the  succession  exhibited  by  plants  and  ani- 
mals, it  has  been  perceived  that  the  march  of  events  from 
the  primitive  simplicity  toward  greater  and  greater  com- 
plication, culminating  in  man,  requires  us  to  assume  the 
existence  of  something  like  permanent  guiding  influences 
in  the  world  of  matter.  ...  In  other  words,  it  seems 
to  me  that  the  naturalist  is  most  likely  to  approach  the 
position  of  the  philosophical  theologian  by  paths  which 
at  first   seemed  to  lie  far  apart  from  his  domain"    (pp. 

46.  47)- 

If  this  be  true,  and  the  naturalist  and  theologian,  one 
working  from  the  standpoint  of  observed  phenomena. 
and  the  other  from  axiomatic  or  revealed  truth,  and  one 
])v  induction  and  the  other  b}^  deduction,  meet  at  length 
like  the  workmen  from  the  two  ends  of  the  Hoosac  tun- 
nel, each  complementing  the  work  of  the  other,  and  each 
affirming  the  discovery  of  what  Prof.  Shaler  calls  "some- 
thing like  permanent  guiding  influences"  in  creation,  im- 
mense gain  has  been  made  that  man  has  been  able  to  dis- 
cover these  purposes ;  and  a  new  teleological  argument  of 
great  cogency  is  added  to  those  formerly  in  our  pos- 
session. 

70 


ST.     PAUL     AS     AN     EVOLUTIONIST 

A  truth  is  more  than  doubly  vahiable  when  thus 
doubl)-  discovered.  It  is  valuable  for  what  it  is  in  itself, and 
for  the  confidence  in  both  processes  which  may  result  in 
other  discoveries.  When  Leverrier  and  Adams,  in  1846, 
separately  computed  the  position  and  orbit  of  a  yet  un- 
discovered planet,  and  Galle,  in  Berlin,  and  Challis,  in 
England,  following  these  calculations,  found  the  planet 
Neptune  through  the  telescope,  the  discovery  was  worth 
more  to  science  than  many  separate  discoveries,  either 
1)y  mathematical  calculation  or  fortuitous  telescopic  ob- 
servation. So  when  the  student  of  the  Bible  and  the  stu- 
dent of  natural  history  come  by  independent  lines  of  re- 
search to  substantial  agreement  upon  a  truth,  the  value 
of  that  discovery  is  more  than  doubled.  It  shows  us  that 
the  lines  of  study  which  seem  to  us  divergent  really 
focus  somewhere,  and  this  gives  us  reason  to  believe  that 
our  study,  fruitful  in  this  instance,  will  be  increasingly 
so  in  other  discoveries. 

GOD  AND  WE  ARE  WORKING  OUT  THE  REDEMPTION 

OF  MAN 

In  his  declaration  of  what  the  world  is  and  what  it 
ought  to  be.  Paul  does  not  forget  the  individual  man. 
his  perplexities,  sorrows  and  sins.  On  the  contrary. 
Paul  begins  with  him  and  relates  his  redemption  to  that 
of  the  universe.  He  says  two  things  by  way  of  explana- 
tion of  the  "vanity,"  as  he  calls  it,  of  creation,  as  related 
to  our  personal  life.  The  first  is  that  even  amid  these 
adverse  conditions,  many  of  which,  taken  singly,  are 
evil  and  only  evil,  the  development  of  righteous  character 
is  not  only  possible  but  may  be  furthered  by  the  resultant 
of  these  conditions.     This  is  great  comfort.     If  we  never 

71 


COSMIC      REDEMPTION 


get  any  further,  this  affords  solid  satisfaction,  tliat  all 
things  work  together  for  good  to  them  that  love  God. 
That  does  not  mean  that  each  in  itself  is  best:  nor  have 
we  a  right  to  insist  upon  that,  if  we  know  how  "all  things 
work." 

But  Paul  says  more  than  this  about  our  personal  re- 
demption. 

This  is  Paul's  reasoning:  As  many  as  are  led  by  the 
Spirit  of  God  are  the  sons  of  God.  Our  spirit  within  us 
cries  out  in  glad  recognition  of  its  divine  paternity.  Nor 
is  it  possible  that  this  is  a  delusion  of  our  own  minds. 
God's  Spirit  concurs  in  the  testimony  that  we  are  sons  of 
God,  and  if  sons,  then  heirs.  To  be  the  heir  of  God 
means  something  so  great  that  we  cannot  measure  it 
aright  except  as  we  reflect  that  we  are  to  share 
the  inheritance  of  Christ.  Creation  is  ours  by  divine  right. 
God's  redemptive  work  is  in  ])rogress  through  us.  The 
whole  creation  groans  with  groaning  like  that  which  we 
ourselves  utter,  waiting  for  the  manifestation  of  our 
divine  sonship  for  its  redemption.  We  groan  within  our- 
selves, waiting  for  the  redemption  of  our  bodies,  but  this 
is  not  the  extent  of  our  redemptive  work.  Creation  was 
made  with  necessary  formative  crudities,  and  waits  for  its 
full  completion  and  glory  for  that  in  hope  of  which  God 
created  the  world  and  us,  that,  blessing  and  being  blessed, 
redeeming  while  we  are  being  redeemed,  we  may  cause 
creation  to  come  into  the  liberty  of  our  glory  as  the  sons 
of  God. 

This  is  an  inspiring  philosophy ;  but  I  do  not  hesitate 
to  say  that  we  need  something  more  than  a  philosophy. 
To  us  it  is  no  academic  question.  Important  as  it  is  that 
we  feel  assured  that  God  reigns,  and  that  our  lives  are 

72 


ST.     PAUL     AS     AN     EVOLUTIONIST 

part  of  His  infinite  plan  of  good,  our  interests  are  so 
personal  and  so  large,  we  have  a  right  to  insist  that 
some  evidence  be  adduced  to  show  that  things  are  ac- 
tually in  progress  in  the  work  of  our  redemption  as  re- 
lates to  the  redemption  of  creation. 

WORLD  REDEMPTION  IS  IN   PROGRESS  AND  IS 
DISCOVERABLE 

Let  m^  instance  two  or  three  "permanent  guiding  ten- 
dencies" which  have  been  discovered,  jointly  by  theolog- 
ians and  naturalists,  and  which  make  for  the  redemption 
of  the  world. 

1.  First  was  the  redemption  from  mere  force,  and  sub- 
jection to  life.  Tiny  and  impotent  appeared  the  first 
forms,  the  infusoria  and  the  lowest  forms  of  vegetable 
life,  yet  life  came  to  rule,  though  it  came  humbly.  Soon 
huge  forms  of  animal  life  and  towering  forests  of  vegeta- 
tion established  their  sway  over  earth,  and  lifeless  force 
reigned  no  longer  supreme. 

2.  Then  by  distinct  advances  came  the  enthronement 
of  mind.  Animal  forms  with  nerve  centres  distributed 
feebly  and  sparsely  throughout  the  body,  acknowledged 
the  sway  of  higher  forms  with  more  centralized  and  pow- 
erful nerve  centres  and  organs  of  special  sense.  Forms 
vast  in  bulk  and  strong  in  limb  and  wing,  but  inferior  fn 
power  of  brain,  disappeared  as  higher  forms  appeared 
with  more  highly  organized  powers  of  brain ;  or,  if  they 
did  not  disappear,  ceased  to  be  masters,  excepting  within 
restricted  limits.  Force  exists  apart  from  mind,  but 
mind,  after  all,  is  enthroned. 

3.  Then  came  man  and  with  man  came  the  dominion 
of   soul.     Man    passed   through    each   of   the    preceding 

73 


COSMIC      REDEMPTION 


stages.  First  in  human  government  was  the  supremacy 
of  force.  The  race  was  ever  to  the  swift  and  the  battle 
to  the  strong.  Then  came  the  supremacy  of  mind.  No 
longer  the  strongest,  but  the  shrewdest,  ruled. 

4.  There  is  a  fourth  and  final  ascent  in  which  comes 
the  supremacy  of  the  good.  Mind  and  mechanical 
force  have  still  their  place,  but  there  is  distinct  progress 
toward  the  domination  of  all  by  the  good.  At  least,  on  all 
hands  this  domination  is  recognized  as  desirable,  and 
there  is  much  gain  even  in  this  recognition,  and  the 
recognition  of  desirability  must  ultimately  lead  to  its 
establishment. 

MAN  IS  REDEEMED  IN  ORDER  TO  WORLD 
REDEMPTION 

The  human  will  is  a  first  cause,  just  as  the  Will  of  God 
is  a  first  cause.  The  enthronement  of  the  soul  of  rnan  in 
the  world  of  matter  and  force  is  so  marvelous  a  fact  that 
we  must  pause  to  consider  the  stages  by  which  it  comes 
to  pass.  Certain  general  movements  we  discover,  and 
the  student  of  history,  of  biology  and  of  Scripture  is 
agreed  upon  them.  It  is  a  great  advantage  that  from 
different  points  of  view  we  see  the  past  essentially  alike. 
Man  began  at  the  bottom,  not  the  top  of  the  hill.  The 
short  time  spent  in  Eden  does  not  at  all  afifect  the  con- 
ditions out  of  which  man  as  he  is  has  come.  The  resi- 
dence of  the  race  in  Eden  had  no  appreciable  effect  upon 
it,  and  the  fall  into  sin  was  quick  and  terrible.  Man  has 
never  been  perfect.  He  was  once  perfect  in  innocence, 
but  very  imperfect  in  strength  and  experience  and  ability 
to  resist  temptation.  He  is,  upon  an  average,  more  near- 
ly perfect,  if  judged  b}^  the  best  specimens  of  the  race, 

74 


SX     PAUL     AS     AN     EVOLUTIONIST 

than  he  appears  ever  to  have  been.  He  is  not  so  inno- 
cent as  he  was  in  Eden,  nor  so  strong  or  fleet  as  he  was 
when  he  dwelt  in  a  cave  and  fought  tooth  and  nail  a  suc- 
cessful battle  with  the  beasts,  but  man  as  he  is  today  is 
a  nearer  approach  to  God's  ideal,  so  science  would  seem 
to  teach,  and  so  the  theologian  must  believe  unless  God's 
work  through  the  ages  has  failed,  than  any  stable  type  as 
yet  inhabiting  the  earth.  Yet  when  we  say  that,  we  say 
a  sad  thing.  Man  as  he  now  lives  upon  the  earth  is  far 
from  perfect,  so  far  that  we  debate  doubtfully  whether 
indeed  perfection  be  possible  for  him.  Much  is  yet  to 
be  attained.  Man,  as  well  as  the  rest  of  creation,  is  sub- 
jected to  vanity. 

But  man  redeemed  becomes  a  redeemer,  at  every  stage 
of  his  uplift  his  mastery  is  redemption. 

The  redemption  of  man  into  his  heritage  as  a  son  ot 
God  involves  the  redemption  of  the  life  of  the  globe 
from  no  small  part  of  its  strife  and  terror,  and  enables  the 
meek  to  inherit  the  earth.  The  lamb  is  no  longer  at  the 
mercy  of  the  lion,  for  man  drives  out  the  lion  and  pro- 
tects the  lamb. 

In  a  certain  part  of  Pennsylvania  (I  understand 
this  to  be  a  true  story)  the  people  are  said  to 
use  the  word  "creature"  to  mean  a  horse.  Other  ani- 
mals if  called  creatures,  have  a  nominal  adjective,  but 
horse  is  simply  "a  creature."  "In  a  village  in  that  region, 
a  church  was  in  need  of  horse  sheds,  and  there  was  much 
delay  in  their  erection.  The  minister  at  length  felt 
moved  to  preach  to  his  members  upon  the  subject,  his 
thesis  being  that  the  animals  under  their  keeping,  which 
had  been  groaning  and  shivering  together  until  now,  had 
reason  to  expect   from   them,  as  professing  Christians, 

75 


COSMIC      REDEMPTION 


Christian  care  and  protection.  All  the  doctrine  which 
he  needed  to  give  his  proposition  Scriptural  basis  he  de- 
duced from  the  text,  "'The  earnest  expectation  of  the 
creature  (that  is  the  horse)  waiteth  the  manifestation  of 
the  sons  of  God."  I  do  not  say  that  that  was  infallible 
exegesis.  But  I  affirm  that  that  was  within  the  meaning 
of  the  text.  The  erection  of  horse  sheds  was  a  test,  so 
tar  forth,  of  the  divine  sonship  of  that  congregation. 
In  their  redemption  their  horses  ought  to  share.  The 
earnest  expectation  of  that  part  of  the  creation  waited  for 
them  to  show,  by  their  humanity,  that  they  were  indeed 
sons  of  God.  That  is  really  what  the  text  means,  that 
when  men  become  sons  of  God,  they  will  so  manifest  that 
fact  that  the  whole  creation,  human  and  animal,  animate 
and  inanimate,  shall  feel  the  redemptive  power  of  it. 

You  must  not  fail  to  notice  the  little  change  in  the 
Revised  Version  concerning  the  liberty  into  which  the 
creation  is  to  come.  It  is  not  the  glorious  liberty  of  the 
children  of  God — that  would  be  impossible.  But  it  is  to 
be  redeemed  into  the  liberty  of  the  glory  of  the  children 
of  God,  that  is.  a  liberty  which  comes  from  our  glory  as 
God's  children.  You  cannot  cause  a  horse  or  a  tree  to 
become  a  son  of  God.  But  you  may  cause  either  to  re- 
ceive a  glory  which  comes  of  your  heritage  as  a  son  of 
God.  In  fact,  we  have  done  it.  We  found  the  horse 
barely  evolved  from  the  insignificant  three  toed  creature 
Avhose  fossil  remains  we  find  in  the  rock :  we  have  cared 
for  him  through  successive  generations,  choosing 
whether  he  shall  be  swift  or  strong,  until  now  we  have 
him,  a  creature  of  power  and  beauty,  finding  enlarged 
ioy  of  existence  in  his  relation  to  man.  Who  can  doubt 
that  existence  has  enlarged  meaning  and  increased  joy 

76 


ST.     PAUL    AS     AN     EVOLUTIONIST 

to  the  modern  carriage  horse,  knowing  his  master  and 
responding  with  signs  of  glad  intelligence  to  his  care 
and  command,  than  to  the  inferior  creature  from  which 
the   horse  has   developed? 

I  do  not  like  the  needless  killing  of  any  inoffensive 
thing.  And  I  profoundly  believe  that  when  good  women 
rise  to  their  full  heritage  as  the  daughters  of  God,  they 
will  not  wear  the  plumage  of  song-birds,  nor  become 
accessories,  even  after  the  fact,  in  the  murder  of  God's 
innocent  and  beautiful  creatures. 

The  redemption  of  man  is  a  redemption  of  inani- 
mate nature.  Man  at  the  beginning  was  the  sport  and 
plaything  of  the  elements.  Storm  and  drought  and  wind 
and  wave,  heat  and  cold,  fire  and  lightning,  consumed 
him  almost  at  their  pleasure.  To  perpetuate  the  race  and 
cause  it  to  subdue  the  earth  and  redeem  it  was  God's  first 
command  to  Adam.  In  obedience  to  this  command  man 
penetrates  the  jungle,  and  makes  it  a  garden.  He  makes 
his  home  upon  the  prairie  and  at  will  causes  a  forest  or 
a  city  to  grow  about  him.  He  enters  the  wilderness  and 
makes  it  blossom  as  the  rose.  He  exalts  every  valley  and 
lays  low  the  mountains  and  hills  and  makes  the  crooked 
straight  and  the  rough  places  plain  that  he  may  build 
his  steel  highways.  Over  the  waves  that  once  over- 
whelmed him,  he  rides  in  triumph.  Across  the  isthmus 
that  once  forbade  his  progress,  he  digs  a  canal  and  sails. 
He  mines  in  the  earth  for  her  secret  treasures,  and  from 
her  grudging  hoard  enriches  his  kind.  He  makes  a  sub- 
way or  an  elevated  road  as  he  prefers,  and  will  yet  sail 
in  the  clouds.  He  creates  land  and  a  nation  where  once 
was  ocean,  and  will  yet  bore  artesian  wells  and  cause  the 
rain  to  fall  in  Sahara.     The  thirsty  land  shall  become  a 

n 


COSMIC      REDEMPTION 


well,  and  parched  place  shall  become  a  pool,  and  in  the 
habitation  of  dragons  where  they  lay  shall  be  grass  with 
reeds  and  rushes. 

All  this  is  meant  to  be  taught  in  the  text.  It  is  not 
God's  final  purpose  that  there  shall  be  any  Desert  of 
Sahara,  any  more  than  that  there  shall  be  what  once,  but 
no  longer,  appeared  on  our  maps  as  "The  Great  American 
Desert."  The  creation  was  made  subject  to  adverse  con- 
ditions, not  accidentally  nor  through  its  own  inherent 
perversity,  but  in  hope  that  man  might  redeem  it  and 
make  earth  receive  of  the  glory  of  His  redemption.  Once 
the  fever-parched  sufferer  died  beneath  the  tree  whose 
bark  would  have  saved  his  life.  The  discovery  of  quinine 
is  a  part  of  the  redemption  of  earth.  The  ocean  west  of 
the  Canary  Islands  had  existed  only  as  the  home  of 
fabulous  monsters  to  strike  terror  to  the  heart  of  the 
sailor.  The  crossing  of  the  Atlantic  by  Columbus,  the 
circumnavigation  of  the  globe  by  Magellan,  these  are  part 
of  the  redemption  of  the  earth.  The  lightning  for  cen- 
turies had  existed  only  as  the  deadly  foe  of  man.  When 
Franklin  stood  in  the  storm  with  his  kite,  and  received 
harmless  into  his  knuckle  the  spark  of  what  but  the  day 
before  had  been  a  universal  terror,  and  made  it  the  slave 
of  man  instead  of  his  master,  it  was  a  part  of  the  re- 
demption of  creation  from  vanity  and  corruption  into  the 
liberty  of  the  glory  of  the  sons  of  God.  When  any  man. 
realizing  his  divine  sonship,  rises  to  the  height  of  his 
privilege,  and  utilizes  some  force  of  nature  which  hither- 
to has  gone  to  waste  or  has  appeared  the  foe  of  man, 
whether  it  be  the  harnessing  of  Niagara  or  the  turning  of 
a  city's  wheels  with  gas  that  before  had  promised  its 
atmosphere,  or  the  discovery  of  the  medicinal  properties 

78 


ST.     PAUL     AS     AN     EVOLUTIONIST 

of  a  hitherto  noxious  weed,  he  is  assisting  in  the  redemp- 
tion of  which  Paul  wrote. 

It  has  become  the  privilege  of  man  to  perform  great 
things.  By  great  things  I  mean  such  as  this — to  plant 
in  the  spring  a  kernel  of  corn  and  with  profound  faith  in 
God  and  in  the  gifts  bestowed  on  man,  to  tend  it  for 
months  and  stand  in  the  autmmn  with  the  ripened  ear 
in  hand.  Does  the  man  who  does  this  great  thing  think 
of  his  accomplishment  simply  with  the  thought  of  the 
number  of  bushels  per  acre  and  the  number  of  cents  per 
bushel  which  his  yield  will  afford?  Then  he  is  living 
below  his  privilege.  He  ought  to  fall  on  his  knees  and 
rejoice  that  he  made  a  co-worker  with  God,  God's  heir, 
with  creation  for  his  inheritance  and  joint  occupancy. 
God  pity  the  farmer  who  does  not  know  that  he  ought 
to  be,  and  may  be  a  son  of  God.  There  is  a  difference 
between  potential  and  actual  sonship.  The  man  who  has 
learned  to  combine  a  few  grains  of  different  kinds  of 
matter  into  a  compound  that  will  move  tons  of  kindred 
matter,  has  demonstrated  his  potential  sonship.  If  he 
uses  dynamite  to  blow  up  his  fellow-man,  he  shows  that 
his  sonship  is  not  actual,  and  that  in  spirit  he  is  a  son  of 
the  evil  one.  And  he  may  use  it  for  higher  purpose  and 
not  understand  the  full  significance  of  what  he  does. 
What  shall  he  do,  for  instance,  when  he  has  tunneled  be- 
neath a  rock  in  the  path  of  commerce,  and  filling  the 
cavity  with  his  new  explosives,  touches  an  electric  but- 
ton and  sees  it  bloAvn  to  fragments  and  sink  harmlessly 
into  deep  water?  Shall  he  simply  deposit  his  check  and 
say,  "That  job  paid  well?"  He  is  welcome  to  his  check, 
and  it  ought  to  be  large,  and  he  ought  to  be  glad  to  get 
it,  but  as  he  reflects  on  the  increased  safety  of  navigatioa 

79 


COSMIC      REDEMPTION 


and  the  benefits  accruing  to  human  kind  through  his 
wonderful  deed,  he  ought  to  thank  God,  who,  for 
humanity's  sake,  has  given  him  to  know  of  His  infinite 
my"steries,  and  enabled  him  to  receive  faith  to  say  to  a 
mountain,  "Be  thou  removed,  and  cast  into  the  midst 
of  the  sea." 

The  apple  which  Eve  gave  to  Adam  in  Eden  was  a 
wild  crab,  sour  and  bitter,  and  possibly  with  a  worm  at 
its  heart ;  for  the  worms  were  here  long  before  man.  The 
apples  that  sell  for  five  dollars  a  barrel  never  grew  in 
Eden ;  they  belong  to  man's  moral  mastery  of  the  world. 
The  roses  that  bloomed  in  Eden  had  five  petals  each,  and 
not  one  of  them  had  more.  The  loving  and  intelligent 
care  of  man  multiplied  the  petals  and  made  them  fifty. 
The  potato  that  grew  in  Eden  was  a  close  relative  of  the 
"'deadly  night-shade"  to  whose  family  it'  belongs,  and 
whose  toxic  qualities  it  barely  misses.  It  was  man  who 
look  this  almost  poisonous  tuber  and  with  it  in  the  time 
of  the  Irish  famine  kept  a  nation  from  starvation. 

Man  found  the  wild  almond  tree  with  a  bitter,  inedible 
■drupe.  He  enriched  the  soil  about  it,  and  kept  the  worm 
from  its  root,  and  planted  the  choicest  of  its  fruit  on  a 
north  slope  where  its  blossoming  was  deterred  until  the 
frosts  were  gone,  and  pruned  its  useless  branches  that 
more  strength  might  go  to  the  fruit,  and  created  the 
peach.  God's  work  in  creation  was  not  finished  until  man 
had  made  the  peach  tree.  It  was  not  finished  then :  for 
man  went  on  and  created  the  apricot,  and  that  also  was 
adopted  by  God  as  His  own,  and  Heaven  smiled  upon  it 
and  it  bore  a  new  fruit  after  its  kind  whose  seed  is  in 
itself.  It  is  not  finished  yet :  it  would  be  rash  to  prophesy 
the  next  new  creation  in  this  or  any  other  department  of 

80 


ST.     PAUL    AS     AN     EVOLUTIONIST 

man's  co-operation  with  God.  Man  does  it  because  he 
is  potentially  a  son  of  God :  if  he  is  not  actually  so,  it  is 
ten  thousand  pities.  It  would  multiply  the  meaning  of 
life  to  yon  man  with  the  pruning-knife  if,  looking  up 
through  the  branches  of  the  tree  which  he  and  God  are 
together  creating,  he  were  to  recognize  God.  "Thou 
madest  him  a  little  lower  than  the  angels?" — I  am  not  so 
sure  about  that:  "Thou  hast  made  him  but  little  lower 
than  God,"  was  what  the  Psalmist  said.  To  which  of 
the  angels  said  he  at  any  time,  "Thou  art  joint  heir  with 
Jesus  Christ." 

This  is  not  saying  that  man  has  improved  upon  God's 
plan :  God's  plan  was  not  complete  without  man's  best 
and  most  skillfully  consecrated  effort.  God  left,  tem- 
porarily, a  spot  on  the  shore  of  Lake  Michigan,  a  barren 
waste  of  sand  and  stutited  trees.  The  building  of  the 
White  City  was  a  part  of  God's  original  plan  for  the 
redemption  of  that  spot  from  its  vanity  and  uselessness. 
What  wonderful  thing  He  intends  to  place  there  a  thous- 
and years  hence  is  beyond  our  imagination :  for  eye  hath 
nor  seen  nor  car  heard,  neither  hath  entered  into  the 
heart  of  man  the  things  that  God  hath  prepared  to  place 
on   earth   for   those   that   love   Him. 

No  part  of  this  redemption  is  complete  that  lacks  the 
moral  element.  The  world  is  not  to  be  saved  simply  by 
steam  engines  and  el^ectric  motors.  It  is  not  the  wheels, 
but  the  spirit  in  the  wheels.  When  we  have  learned  to 
control  the  forces  of  nature  we  have  made  progress  possi- 
ble ;  when  we  have  actually  taken  control  of  them  for 
good,  we  have  made  real  progress.  No  discoveries  in  the 
arts  and  sciences  will  redeem  men,  but  as  soon  as  these 
are  claimed  by  the  sons  of  God,  that  through  their  rule 

81 


COSMIC      REDEMPTION 


over  earth  and  Christ's  rule  in  them,  He  may  rule  over 
all,  God  blessed  forever,  then  is  the  end  attained.  We 
must  never  be  content  with  the  scaffolding.  The  king- 
dom of  Heaven  is  not  steam  and  electricity,  though  it 
needs  both.  It  is  not  dry-goods  and  drugs  and  piles  of 
masonry,  though  all  these  are  part  of  its  equipment.  The 
kingdom  has  come  and  is  yet  coming,  and  it  is  among 
3'^ou.  Your  redemption  fs  an  end,  but  yet  a  means.  In 
the  realm  of  morals,  as'  in  physics,  every  effect  becomes 
a  cause.  We  still  groan  within  ourselves  waiting  for  the 
adoption,  the  complete  emancipation  of  our  bodies  from 
the  lower  laws  of  the  fleshly  appetites  to  the  higher  laws 
of  spiritual  holiness,  but  the  creation  is  waiting  for  the 
manifestation  of  the  degree  of  sonship  which  we  have 
already  received.  Something  of  His  fulness  we  have 
already  received,  and  grace  there  to  supersede  each  grace 
with  higher  grace  till  our  redemption,  and  that  of  crea- 
tion through  us,  i:^  complete. 

WHAT    ABOUT   THE    FUTURE? 

■  This  redemption  is  to  permeate  and  transform  all 
human  society.  Such  a  consummation  seems  very  far 
away,  does  it  not?  It  is  far  away,  but  it  is  less  far  than 
it  was.  Men  are  just  beginning  to  believe  in  it.  The 
employer  in  his  office  and~the  employe  in  his  workshop 
are  both  to  recognize,  each  himself, and  each  his  brother, 
as  a  son  of  God.  Through  the  redemption  of  the  individ- 
uals composing  society  all  social  relations  vv^ill  be  re- 
deemed. Not  only  our  prayers  but  our  commerce  and 
our  legislation  will  be  full  of  praise  to  God. 

Does  anyone  say,  ''This  sounds  well,  but  it  is  a  delu- 
sion.    The  world  is  old  and  wicked  and  near  its  end?" 


ST.     PAUL     AS     AN     EVOLUTIONIST 

I'eople  have  been  saying  that  for  two  thousand  years. 
But  it  is  a  mistake.  The  world  is  new  and  wicked  and 
its  end  is  so  far  away  that  all  time  spent  in  talking  about 
the  need  of  it  is  wasted.  The  world  is  only  on  its  trial 
trip.  The  engines  were  not  in  until  Christ  came.  That 
was  the  time  which  Paul  recognized  as  the  beginning — 
all  has  been  preparatory,  pre-natal,  "until  now."  The 
l)earings  are  rough  and  the  crew  is  raw,  and  the  fires  are 
badly  tended  and  the  water  gets  below  in  the  boiler,  and 
some  of  the  crew  are  mutinous  and  the  log  shows  a 
crooked  course,  and  every  day  someone  falls  overboard, 
but  God  has  been  too  many  millenniums  building  it  to  let 
it  l)low  up  a  few  days  after  the  launching.  Spite  of  all 
our  incompetence  and  sin  and  our  fears  for  the  future, 
God  is  at  the  helm. 
THE  PRESENT  JUSTIFIES  FAITH  IN  THE  FUTURE 

And  we  have  actually  made  progress.  Character  is 
steadily  advancing.  The  best  specimens  on  earth  today 
are  better  than  the  best  specimens  the  world  has  ever 
exhibited.  Man  began  at  the  bottom  of  the  hill.  His 
experience  in  Eden  did  not  count  in  his  favor  in  his  up- 
ward struggle.  It  has  done  us  good  in  two  respects,  it 
keeps  us  from  saying  that  the  race  would  have  done  bet- 
ter had  it  started  with  a  fair  chance,  and  it  keeps  before 
us  the  thought  that  this  terrible  struggle  with  want  and 
lal^or  and  sin  is  not  what  God  intends  for  the  race  ulti- 
mate) v.  But  did  you  think  that  God  had  simply  undertaken 
to  produce  as  good  character  as  that  with  which  Adam  was 
created?  Character  is  the  one  good  thing  God  cannot 
create.  It  is  a  growth.  Adam  had  no  character  before  his 
sin,  and  his  character  after  that  event,  the  character  he 
beciueathed  to  the  race,  was  almost  hopelessly  bad.     We 

83 


COSMIC      REDEMPTION 

inherit  no  more  from  Eden  than  if  the  race  had  never 
been  there.  But  as  to  x\dam's  character — if  we  may 
imagine  him  to  have  had  a  fragment  of  it  in  his  inno- 
cence— it  was  to  the  best  character  of  today  as  the  amoeba 
is  to  the  vertebrate.  Never  was  a  sin  committed  upon  so 
shamefully  slight  provocation.  Adam  did  not  steal  the 
fruit  because  he  was  hungry:  I  can  show  you  men  who 
have  been  hungry  to  starvation  and  have  not  stolen. 
.\dam  knew  that  in  the  day  he  ate  he  would  surely  die, 
and  he  ate  and  died :  I  can  show  you  men  who  have  in- 
herited an  appetite  for  drink,  and  to  whom  it  is  revealed 
afresh,  perhaps  after  years  of  dissipation,  that  in  every 
day  they  drink  they  die  to  all  good,  and  who  stop  by  the 
grace  of  God,  and  thereafter  do  not  drink,  but  struggle 
with  the  appetite  every  day  with  such  heroism  as  Adam 
was  incapable  of  showing,  and  finally  trample  temptation 
under  foot  and  live.  I  can  select  a  man  and  woman  with 
all  their  inherited  tendencies  to  sin,  but  with  some  other 
tendencies  as  well,  a  young  husband  and  wife,  children 
of  Christian  parents,  having  early  given  themselves  as  in 
infancy  they  had  been  given  to  God,  and  I  will  place 
them,  not  in  Eden,  but  him  in  the  office  or  shop  or  fac- 
tory, with  all  the  temptations  of  modern  social  and  busi- 
ness life,  infinitely  greater  than  Adam  experienced,  and 
her  in  the  home  with  all  its  cares  and  weariness  and 
vexations,  and  in  fift}^  years  show  you  the  same  couple 
with  faces  deeply  furrowed  with  marks  of  their  struggles 
against  want  and  care  and  sickness  and  sin,  but  with 
those  wrinkled  features  shining  like  the  face  of  Moses 
when  he  came  down  from  the  mount.  They  have  not 
been  perfect — far  from  it.  But  the  tenor  of  those  lives 
has  been  one  of  consistent  well-doing,  and  the  result  is 

84 


ST.     PAUL     AS     AN     EVOLUTIONIST 

character  beside  which  that  of  Adam  and  Eve  deserves  to 
be  mentioned  only  by  way  of  contrast.  And  the  ten- 
dency toward  righteousness  which  they  transmit  to  their 
posterity  shows  itself  as  unmistakably  as  the  tendency 
toward  sin  transmitted  by  our  first  parents.  We  have 
much  yet  to  gain,  but,  thank  God,  the  gain  already  made 
is  not  small !  You,  my  brother,  who  have  not  claimed 
your  privilege  as  a  child  of  God,  and  view  this  struggle  as 
though  you  had  no  part  in  it,  I  am  not  afraid  that  for 
lack  of  your  co-operation  God's  plan  will  fail  of  its  ac- 
complishment ;  I  am  only  afraid  that  you  will  not  get  in 
in  time  to  share  in  the  glory.  I  know  how  good  a  man  you 
think  you  are,  and  I  share,  to  a  considerable  extent,  your 
opinion ;  but  others  struggled,  generation  after  genera- 
tion, to  make  it  possible  for  as  good  a  man  as  you  to  be 
born  and  live,  and  the  whole  creation,  with  its  centuries 
of  pain  and  groaning,  is  waiting  now  for  the  manifesta- 
tion of  your  divine  sonship  in  Christ. 

Perhaps  I  have  been  using  the  term  redemption  of 
things  so  material  that  some  will  deny  its  applicability.  I 
believe  that  all  that  we  have  been  considering  is  part  of 
the  redemptive  plan  of  God,  a  plan  that  cuts  through  all 
the  strata  of  the  creative  and  progressive  ages.  But  I 
should  be  most  unwilling  to  stop  with  this.  The  first 
thing,  as  Paul  tells  us,  is  that  the  Spirit  of  God  in  Christ 
shall  so  quicken  us  that  we,  too,  shall  be  children  of  God, 
not  merely  potentially  but  actually ;  and  that  Christ  shall 
thus  become  the  first  born  among  many  brethren.  To  as 
many  as  receive  Him,  and  in  proportion  as  they  receive 
Him,  to  them  gives  He  the  power  to  become  what  God 
made  them  to  be,  the  sons  of  God,  and  the  creators  with 
God  of  the  world  that  is  to  be. 

85 


COSMIC     REDEMPTION 

THE  EVANGEL  FOR  TODAY 
Cosmic  redemption,  social  redemption,  redemption  of 
every  kind,  depends  upon  the  redemption  of  the  individ- 
ual soul.  We  shall  not  come  to  any  socialistic  scheme  for 
the  wholesale  regeneration  of  the  world  that  ignores  the 
individual.  The  message  to  the  redeemed  nation  is,  as 
of  old,  that  the  wicked  individual  must  forsake  his  way 
and  the  unrighteous  man  his  thoughts  and  return  to 
the  Lord.  But  we  do  not  live  in  isolation,  but  in  social 
relations.  We  are  bound  together  by  myriad  ties,  do- 
mestic, commercial,  civil  and  political.  The  regenera- 
tion of  the  individual  makes  in  increasing  ratio  for  the 
redemption  of  all  these  relations.  It  is  not  a  dream,  but 
a  vision  from  Heaven,  and  we  must  never  lose  it.  Our 
politics  will  be  redeemed  from  its  corruption.  Neither 
the  greed  of  the  capitalist  nor  the  lawlessness  of  the 
laboring  man  shall  rule  in  the  industrial  world.  Neither 
"the  submerged  tenth"  in  the  slums  nor  the  uselessly 
ornamental  "four  hundred"  shall  be  the  permanent  type 
of  society.  Neither  partisan  bigotry  nor  private  spec- 
ulation shall  dictate  our  legislation.  The  hour  cometh 
and  now  is  for  the  uttering  of  a  new  redemptive  message, 
yet  old  as  the  Protevangelium.  The  groaning  has  been 
until  now:  it  is  time  for  the  redemption  to  begin  anew 
and  in  earnest. 

The  holy  city,  the  New  Jerusalem,  is  coming  down 
from  God,  yet  it  is  to  be  fashioned  of  boards  and  bricks 
and  mortar  and  stones  and  iron,  by  men.  It  cometh  not 
with  observation.  We  need  not  stand  gazing  up  into 
heaven  for  it.  This  same  Jesus  who  ascended,  is  now 
descending  in  like  manner  as  He  ascended, — unrecog- 
nized by  the  world  at  large,  and  undiscovered  by  those 

86 


ST.    PAUL    AS    AN    EVOLUTIONIST 

who  go  out  into  the  wilderness  or  into  the  secret  cham- 
bers following  the  cry  "Lo,  here!"  and  "Lo,  there!"  Let 
us  awake,  for  our  salvation  is  nearer  than  when  we  first 
believed,  and  nearer  than  we  are  now  ready  to  believe. 
The  world  lieth  in  evil — partly,  but  its  redemption  dawns. 
God  never  hurries:  a  thousand  years  with  Him  is  as  a 
day,  but  He  works  to  no  uncertain  purpose.  How  many 
generations  must  pass  ere  the  work  is  complete,  no  man 
knoweth;  but  there  are  some  standing  by  who  see  daily 
the  increasing  glory  of  the  redemption  for  which  the 
Father  worketh  hitherto,  and  Christ  and  His  brethren 
work. 


87 


Eort),  ^Jjoto  Wisi  ^Tfje  Jfatter,  anb  3t  ^ufficetfj  Mjs. 


Oh,  Mary's  Son,  if  thou  be  man,  and  only  man  indeed. 
Still  hath  thy  life  and  word  a  power  to  meet  my  spirit's 
need; 
And  thou  shalt  still  my  pattern  be,  for  thought    and  word 
and  deed, — 
Thy  will  my  law,  thy  life  my  aim,    thy    word    my    faith 
and  creed. 

Oh,  Mary's  Son!     If    in  thee  dwelt  a  life  still  more  divine. 
If  thou  didst  work  as  God  alone  could  work  with  power 
and  sign, — 
In  Thee  I  find  those  attributes  which  I  to  God  assign; 
What  God  would  mean  to    lives  of    men,    thou,    Christ, 
shalt  be  to  mine. 

Oh,  Mary's  Son!  What  e'er  I  doubt,  or  fail  to  understand, 
Thee,  Thee  I  know,  and  God  in  thee,  and  part  that  God 
hath  planned; 
And  thou  henceforth  my  Lord  shalt  be,   for   all    thou    dost 
command. 
And  all  thou  would'st  I    yet  can  do,  if  thou  wilt  hold  my 
hand. 

Oh,  Son  of  God!  When  weak  my  faith,  and  fails  my  trem- 
bling heart 
When  God  grows  silent  in  earth's  din,  or  hid  behind  its 
mart. 
Show  me  my  God;  show  me  thyself;  for  what  God  is,  Thou 
art! 
And  in  thy  gracious,  saving  work.  Lord,  grant   to    me  a 
part! 

William  E.  Barton. 


tKije  Cemptationsi  in  tfje 
OTiltrernesis; 


Text:  "And  a  voice  came  out  of  the  heavens,  saying,  Thou 
art  my  beloved  Son;  in  thee  I  am  well  pleased.  And  straight- 
way the  Spirit  driveth  him  forth  into  the  wilderness.  And  he 
was  in  the  wilderness  forty  days,  tempted  of  Satan;  and  he 
was  with  the  wild  beasts;  and  the  angels  ministered  unto 
him."      Mark    1:    11-13. 

The  moral  lessons  of  Holy  Scripture  are  writ  large 
upon  the  surface  of  the  narrative.  The  difficulties  in- 
cidental to  its  interpretation  lie  for  the  most  part  well 
below  the  sphere  of  practical  duty.  This  is  as  it  should 
be,  and  is  one  element  in  the  power  of  the  Bible  over 
human  lives.  The  lessons  of  the  temptation  of  Jesus 
Christ  are  plain  before  the  vision  of  the  untutored  reader 
of  the  Bible  and  easily  discernible  by  the  child  in  the 
Sunday  School.  Jesus,  the  son  of  God,  was  not  too 
divine  to  share  our  human  temptations;  having  Himself 
been  tempted  He  is  able  to  help  the  tempted.  Jesus 
resisted  Satan,  and,  though  tempted,  was  sinless.  In 
this  He  is  our  constant  example  and  inspiration.  Jesus 
being  tempted  called  to  his  aid  his  childhoon  knowledge 
of  the  Word  of  God ;  even  so  should  we  arm  ourselves 
with  the  promises  of  God,  which  shall  be  for  our  salva- 
tion in  times  when  we  are  tempted  to  do  wrong. 

These  are  the  plain,  simple  lessons  of  the  temptation 
of  Jesus  Christ.  A  wayfaring  man,  though  a  fool,  need 
not  err  therein;  nor  can  a  little  child  go  far  astray  in 
appropriating  their  spiritual  value. 

It  is  only  when  we  enter  into  the  subjective  meanings 

89 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

of  the  temptation  of  Jesus  that  difficulties  lie  in  our  path. 
It  is  because  we  are  seeking  to  go  somewhat  deeper  than 
our  ordinary  studies  that  we  are  likely  to  encounter  these 
difficulties  in  our  consideration  of  this  subject  today. 
Perhaps  we  would  prefer  not  to  meet  them,  to  be  sweet- 
ly content  with  the  manifest  lessons  which  we  find  at 
the  threshold ;  and  there  is  nothing  to  compel  us  to  go 
farther  unless  we  choose  to  do  so ;  but  if  our  faith  in- 
cites us  to  a  somewhat  more  thorough  and  systematic 
study,  then  let  us  go  on  and  endeavor  to  make  real  to 
ourselves  if  we  can  the  character  of  the  temptation  con- 
sidered as  a  crisis  in  the  spiritual  life  of  Jesus. 

The  temptation  of  Jesus,  following  immediately  after 
his  baptism,  compelled  our  Lord  to  answer  certain  defin- 
ite questions  thrust  upon  Him  by  the  consciousness 
of  his  divine  Sonship.  What  these  questions  were  and 
hovv^  He  answered  them,  we  are  endeavoring  to  find  in 
the  study  of  this  hour. 

And  now  if  wc  are  to  undertake  this  study  at  all,  let 
us  not  begin  by  denying  the  narrative.  Quite  too  often 
good  people  have  felt  under  obligation  to  explain  away 
this  incident.  They  have  assumed  that  because  Jesus 
was  divine  there  could  not  really  have  been  any  tempta- 
tion in  the  sense  that  Jesus  felt  any  impulse  to  yield.  They 
have  even  said  that  being  the  Son  of  God  He  could  not 
possibly  have  yielded ;  and  so  in  their  praiseworthy  at- 
tempt to  be  reverent,  and  their  wholesome  fear  of  an}^ 
implied  denial  of  the  divinity  of  Jesus,  they  really  have 
denied   the   truth   of  the   Scripture   narrative. 

This  story  means  nothing  at  all,  and  can  mean  noth- 

90 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

ing,  if  it  does  not  mean  that  Jesus  passed  through  a 
tremendous  struggle  in  which  He  balanced  all  the  mo- 
tives involved  in  a  series  of  real  and  terrible  tempta- 
tions. Unless  we  are  all  willing  to  understand  this,  it 
is  better  that  we  stop  where  we  are  and  decline  to  con- 
sider' the  temptation  at  all ;  but  assuming  that  we  really 
believe  that  there  was  a  temptation,  that  Jesus  was  not 
enacting  a  superficial  part  in  a  mock  tragedy  that  had 
no  meaning  to  His  own  soul ;  assuming  that  the  story 
involves  all  that  it  seems  to  involve,  let  us  try  to  find,  so 
far  as  we  can,  what  the  temptation  meant  to  Him. 

First  of  all,  let  us  notice  the  startling  juxtaposition 
of  the  baptism  and  the  temptation.  The  voice  out  of 
heaven  spoke  to  Him,  "Thou  art  my  Beloved  Son;  in 
thee  I  am  well  pleased,"  "And  immediately"  (the  word 
of  Mark  permits  no  interval  after  this  moment  of  high 
spiritual  exultation),  "immediately  the  Spirit  driveth 
Him  into  the  wilderness."  The  word  "driveth"  is  one 
of  holy  violence,  and  is  startling  in  its  close  relationship 
with  the  story  of  the  descent  of  the  Spirit  of  God  upon 
Him. 

Some  of  the  early  fathers  refused  to  believe  that  it 
was  the  Holy  Spirit  that  drove  Him  into  the  wilderness; 
it  must  have  been  the  evil  spirit  they  said,  the  spirit 
by  which  subsequently  He  was  tempted.  But  the  Scrip- 
tures do  not  permit  of  this  dualistic  interpretation.  The 
same  Spirit  that  descended  upon  Jesus  in  the  form  of  a 
dove,  the  same  Spirit  that  testified  that  He  was  the 
Son  of  God,  that  Spirit  drove  Him  into  the  desert  to 
meet  the  devil  in  a  hand-to-hand  encounter. 

Startling  as   this   sequence  is,  we   cannot  fail   to   feel 

91 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

the  truth  of  it  in  life.  The  moment  of  high  consecra- 
tion which  Jesus  experienced  in  baptism  brought  its 
swift  and  mighty  reaction  within  the  soul ;  the  very  glory 
of  his  divine  consciousness  had  its  penumbra  of  ques- 
tionings and  decisions.  If  we  are  at  liberty  to  interpret 
the  experience  of  Jesus  by  our  own,  we  can  the  more 
readily  understand  this  situation. 

Do  you  remember  the  bravest  deed  of  your  life — 
the  time  you  did  the  thing  that  made  every  one  wonder, 
and  you  wondered  at  yourself?  Not  at  the  moment  did 
you  wonder;  you  never  stopped  to  think  of  yourself; 
but  when  it  was  all  over  you  found  someone  throwing 
water  in  your  face.  So  mighty  was  the  reaction  from  that 
moment  of  heroism.  And  you  never  yet  have  been  quite 
able  to  understand  how  you  did  the  heroic  act.  Some 
of  the  greatest  things  in  life  are  done  in  that  way.  We 
walk  straight  to  the  baptism  of  our  new  resolution,  and 
we  feel  the  descent  of  the  Spirit  upon  our  hearts,  and 
then  comes  a  sudden  moment  in  which  we  demand  of 
ourselves  what  in  the  world  we  are  doing;  and  whether 
we  are  sincere;  and  then  we  hasten  into  the  wilderness 
to  meet  our  own  soul  face  to  face  in  the  solitude  of  self- 
hood, and  give  a  reason  for  our  faith  and  deed. 

And  this  enables  us  better  to  understand  that  instead 
of  three  temptations,  there  were  four.  "If  thou  be  the 
Son  of  God,"  said  Satan.  What  a  temptation  was  im 
plied  in  the  word  "if !"  The  moment  Jesus  was  by  Him- 
self, must  He  not  have  demanded  of  Himself,  what  was 
this  presumptuous  thing  He  had  done,  and  how  was  He 
to  face  the  consequence  of  so  rash  a  step  as  He  had 
taken?     "If  thou  be  the  Son  of  God!"     Was  He  really 

92 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

the  Son  of  God?  Was  this  the  meaning  of  those  boy- 
hood wonderings,  those  questions  of  adolescence  that 
had  come  to  Him  in  His  studies,  those  recent  longings 
and  resolutions?  Was  this  what  He  had  come  out  into 
the  wilderness  to  see,  not  merely  John  the  prophet,  but 
Himself,  His  very  self,  the  long  predicted  Messiah?  Was 
He,  the  peasant  Jesus,  the  Son  of  God?  How  did  He 
know  it?  How  could  He  know  it?  And  yet  He  did 
know  it.  "This,"  He  said  to  himself,  "this  is  my  mis- 
sion ;  this  is  the  answer  to  the  thousand  questions  of 
my  thirty  years.  I  am  the  Messiah,  the  son  of  David, 
the  expected  king;  I  am  He  of  whom  Moses  in  the  Law 
and  the  prophets  did  write;  I  heard  the  voice,  I  saw 
the  dove,  I  feel  the  witness  in  my  soul ;  I  am  the  Son 
of  God.  But  am  I  ?  These  hands,  are  they  not  the  hands 
of  a  carpenter,  calloused  and  rough  with  toil?  My  ed- 
ucation, has  it  not  been  that  of  a  peasant  lad?  My 
associates,  what  one  of  them  has  ever  thought  of  such 
a  thing?  What  will  my  friends  and  neighbors  say  when 
I  go  back  and  tell  them  of  it?  What  will  the  priests  in 
Jerusalem  say  about  accepting  a  prophet  from  Galilee? 
Can  I  tell  them  about  that  vanishing  vision  of  the  dove? 
Can  I  assure  them  that  I  heard  a  voice  out  of  the 
clouds?  Shall  I  call  upon  Caiaphas  and,  sitting  with  him 
in  some  splendid  chamber  of  the  Temple,  tell  him  that 
I,  Jesus,  a  village  carpenter,  from  a  town  of  which  he 
never  has  heard,  am  the  Christ? 

The  dove  was  no  longer  visible,  the  voice  no  longer 
spoke,  there  no  longer  was  a  halo  above  Him,  only  the 
hostile  glare  of  the  desert  sun;  the  heavens  and  earth 
were  silent  with  the  intolerable  silence  of  the  wilderness; 

93 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

nothing  could  He  hear  save  the  questions  of  His  own 
heart,  and  the  voice  of  the  tempter.  Was  He  indeed 
the  Son  of  God? 

To  all  great  souls  come  these  moments  of  reaction 
when  the  spirit  with  violence  driveth  them  into  the  wil- 
derness, and  puts  their  faith  to  the  test  of  solitude.  I 
do  not  suppose  that  Satan  was  visibly  present.  I  have 
no  thought  that  there  appeared  before  the  Master  any 
terrible  being  with  hoofs  and  horns.  The  voice  of  the 
tempter  was  the  voice  of  doubt  within  His  own  heart, 
demanding  that  He  prove  His  claim  before  the  bar  of 
His  own  conscience  and  reason. 

"If  thou  be  the  Son  of  God;"  the  divinity  of  Christ 
met  no  severer  test  than  that  which  self-imposed  He  met 
in  the  silence  of  the  wilderness. 

Jesus  could  no  longer  assure  Himself  by  anything  ex- 
ternal ;  He  could  not  command  the  heavens  to  be  con- 
tinuously resonant  with  the  voice  crying  out,  "Thou 
art  the  Son  of  God ;"  He  could  not  compel  the  Spirit 
to  be  forever  descending  upon  Him  to  assure  his  wav- 
ering faith.  Nothing  could  assure  Him  now  save  the 
Spirit  of  God  within  His  heart,  bearing  witness  with  His 
spirit  that  He  was  the  Son  of  God,  and  if  a  son  then  an 
heir,  and  the  inheritor  of  the  promise  of  God  to  His 
Messiah. 

Thus,  was  He  "tempted  like  as  we  are,"  even  as  the 
Apostle  declares,  because  as  the  New  Testament  assures 
us  He  learned  obedience  by  the  things  which  He  suffered, 
and  so  being  tempted  He  becomes  our  deliverer. 

The   second   temptation   is   that  which   is   commonly 

94 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

counted  as  the  first.  "Command  these  stones  to  be  made 
bread."  He  had  need  enough  of  bread,  for  He  was 
hungry.  He  had  need  enough  of  something  to  assure 
Himself  that  He  could  make  bread  out  of  stones  if  He 
chose  to  do  so.  Whatever  the  Christ  was  to  do,  He 
would  have  followers  who  must  be  fed.  He  had  never 
wrought  a  miracle.  Would  it  not  be  well  to  practice  a 
little  and  assure  Himself  that  He  could  do  it  when  He 
needed  to?  And  what  better  time  and  what  better  rea- 
son than  just  now,  when  He  was  hungry  and  con- 
scious of  his  power?  And  if  He  could  indeed  make  bread 
from  stones,  his  future  was  secure. 

Surely  we  can  understand  this  temptation  of  the 
Master!  There  is  no  man  of  power  who  does  not  meet 
it,  and  the  higher  he  rises  the  more  subtle  is  the  temp- 
tation. The  commercializing  of  the  gift  of  God  is  one 
of  the  most  insidious  of  temptations  of  every  age,  and 
is  the  peculiar  peril  of  this  present  age.  It  is  the  more 
a  peril  because  it  runs  so  close  to  human  need.  We 
have  to  live  by  the  talents  God  has  given  us,  and 
whether  we  live  richly  or  by  a  bare  meeting  of  life's 
sternest  necessities  depends  in  a  great  measure  on  the 
number  of  our  gifts  and  the  use  we  make  of  them. 
The  world  has  agreed  that  it  is  right,  that  he  who  has 
ten  talents  and  adds  other  ten  shall  be  ruler  over  ten 
cities.  This  also  appears  to  be  the  judgment  of  heaven. 
But  at  what  point  in  this  process  of  making  commend- 
able use  of  an  opportunity  do  we  meet  the  danger  of 
commercializing  God's  gifts?  When  shall  we  assure 
ourselves  that  we  may  properly  exercise  our  talents  for 
the  feeding  of  ourselves  and  those  dependent  upon  us, 

95 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

and  when  must  we  go  hungry  that  so  the  deeper  work 
of  grace  may  manifest  itself  within  us? 

There  are  temptations  which  spring  out  of  our  bitter 
needs;  and  Jesus  met  this  kind  when  He  hungered  in 
the  wilderness;  but  there  are  other  temptations  which 
grow  out  of  our  conscious  power,  and  they  appeal  to 
us  through  our  knowledge  that  we  are  favored  of  God. 
There  is  not  a  man  in  any  position  of  power  or  influ- 
ence who  does  not  meet  at  the  very  threshold  of  his 
self-discovery  the  temptation  which  Jesus  met.  We  are 
hungry  ;  and  hunger  is  the  legitimate  need  of  food.  We  are 
accustomed,  just  as  Jesus  had  been,  to  sell  our  labor 
in  the  market  and  feed  ourselves  with  the  results  of  it. 
This  is  legitimate  and  right.  Who  now  shall  forbid 
us,  in  the  current  language  of  the  day,  "to  charge  all 
the  traffic  will  bear"  and  "make  hay  while  the  sun 
shines"?  We  are  living  in  a  prosperous  era  of  the 
world's  history ;  an  age  in  which  the  pauper  is  better 
fed  than  the  prince  of  yesterday ;  an  age  when  the  pro- 
ducts and  resources  of  the  world  oflfer  themselves  in 
tempting  response  to  our  legitimate  desires.  How  shall 
we  gratify  these  real  honorable  needs  of  our  physical 
lives  and  not  commercialize  the  gift  of  God? 

Consider  how  real  the  temptation  is.  The  farmer  en- 
ters into  partnership  with  the  sunshine  and  the  rain  and 
the  soil  and  produces  an  acre  of  corn, — a  joint  product 
of  God's  labor  and  his  own, — and  his  first  and,  too  often, 
his  last  question  is,  "For  how  much  can  I  sell  it  a 
bushel?"  The  miner  digs  in  the  earth  and  strikes  a  rich 
vein  of  ore  and  bores  and  finds  oil  or  gas.  Rightly  he 
rejoices  in  his  prosperity,  but  how  shall  he  learn  that 

96 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

he  has  another  question  to  ask  than  how  much  will  be 
the  premium  on  his  mining  stock,  or  the  price  per  gallon 
of  his  oil?  There  is  a  point  at  which  such  a  question 
is  legitimate;  there  is  an  invisible  point  at  which  it 
passes  into  a  corroding  peril  of  the  soul.  Milton  wrote 
"Paradise  Lost,"  and  its  value  to  the  world  is  not  to 
be  measured  by  the  $25  which  the  publisher  paid  him 
for  it.  Yet  we  tend  to  and,  almost  inevitably,  do  measure 
all  things  by  this  standard.  Consider  how  far  this  goes 
and  see  how  the  temptation  grows  out  of  the  very  fact 
that  within  certain  limits  the  process  is  legitimate. 

An  artist  has  painted  the  face  of  Christ,  and  from 
his  canvas  the  eyes  of  the  Son  of  God  look  into  the  souls 
of  men.  How  much  can  he  sell  it  for?  A  singer  sings, 
"I  Know  that  My  Redeemer  Liveth,"  and  there  springs 
up  in  the  souls  of  those  who  hear  the  mighty  triumphant 
hope  of  everlasting  life.  How  much  can  she  get  a  night 
for  singing  it? 

A  physician  discovers  a  cure  for  diphtheria  or  cancer. 
How  can  he  utilize  it  in  order  to  make  him  rich? 

A  man  makes  a  mighty  invention  and  learns  to  dive 
to  the  ocean's  bottom,  or  takes  the  wings  of  the  morn- 
ing and  flies  through  the  air  with  the  swiftness  of  an 
angel,  and  in  that  discovery  the  dream  of  his  soul  has 
become  actual;  he  has  discovered  himself;  the  vision 
and  the  voice  of  God  are  his  as  well  as  the  acclaim  of 
men.     For  how  much  can  he  capitalize  his  patent? 

A  lawyer  makes  an  able  plea;  he  stands  as  the  advo- 
cate not  only  of  a  particular  client,  but  as  the  repre- 
sentation of  God's  eternal  justice  demanding  the  right- 

97 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

eousness  of  heaven  at  the  hands  of  a  lawful  tribunal 
of  earth.     How  large  is  his  retainer? 

A  man  is  elected  to  a  public  office  by  a  vote  that  in- 
dicates that  he.  has  won  the  confidence  of  a  thousand  or 
so  of  his  fellow  citizens.  How  shall  he  capitalize  that 
confidence  and  use  the  honor  and  the  trust  of  his  fellow- 
men  to  get  and  to  gain  for  himself  the  utmost  of  finan- 
cial advantage? 

A  minister  preaches  the  Gospel  with  the  power  of  the 
Spirit  of  God,  and  souls  are  born  into  the  kingdom  of 
God  and  sinful  men  have  begotten  within  them  the 
power  of  a  new  life  "hid  with  God  in  Jesus  Christ." 
How  much  will  it  help  him  toward  a  call  to  a  church 
that  will  pay  a  larger  salary? 

Now  there  is  a  point  at  which  every  man  must  earn 
his  bread  by  the  gift  of  God  operating  through  his  own 
personality.  There  is  a  point  at  which  in  that  process 
comes  the  temptation  of  the  devil,  and  he  .needs  to  cry 
out  like  the  Apostle  of  old,  "Thy  money  perish  with 
thee  because  thou  hast  thought  to  buy  the  gift  of  God 
with  gold."  There  is  no  man  called  of  God  to  do  a 
thing  worth  doing  who  does  not  need  to  meet  in  the 
solitude  of  his  own  heart  what  Jesus  Christ  met  at  the 
threshold  of  his  ministry.  It  is  the  question  which 
the  Spirit  drives  us  to  consider,  and  he  who  fails  to 
consider  it  by  assuming  that  the  only  meaning  of  his 
business  is  to  turn  stones  into  bread  or  bread  into  cash, 
that  man  unconsciously  has  met  the  devil  and  the  devil 
has  had  his  way  with  him;  but  the  man  who,  living  in 
the  world  and  earning  his  bread  by  honest  sweat,  realizes 
that  man  does  not  live  by  bread  alone,  and  that  even 

98 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

his  business  has  a  larger  meaning  than  the  mere  pro- 
duction of  food,  that  man  shares  with  Jesus  Christ  in 
the  glory  of  his  triumph  over  temptation. 

The  third  temptation  is  on  a  higher  plane.  It  comes 
to  a  man  who  has  met  and  settled  the  first  and  second 
questions;  he  has  assured  himself  of  his  divine  mission 
and  has  resolved  that  he  will  use  it  for  some  higher  need 
than  mere  bread. 

Jesus  had  to  ask  Himself  how  He  should  announce  to 
the  world  that  He  was  really  the  Messiah.  He  thought 
of  the  various  ways  in  which  He  might  do  it.  In  imag- 
ination He  saw  Himself  in  the  Temple  at  Jerusalem.  He 
found  a  door  by  which  He  might  climb  to  the  roof  and 
take  his  stand  upon  some  dizzy  height  that  would  at- 
tract to  Him  the  gaze  and  apprehension  of  the  crowd 
below.  Just  as  all  eyes  were  fixed  upon  Him  He  would 
leap  down  among  them  and  declare  Himself  to  be  the 
Messiah.  With  what  pride  could  He  announce  it;  with 
what  joy  that  His  divine  Sonship  meant  His  elevation 
above  the  common  lot  of  other  men.  The  peculiar  thing 
about  this  temptation  is  that  it  is  the  temptation  of  the 
good ;  it  is  the  temptation  of  the  man  of  recognized  merit 
to  put  himself  where  men  shall  gaze  at  him  and  applaud 
his  goodness  and  his  power.  Jesus  never  flung  Himself 
from  any  pinnacle  to  be  seen  of  men.  The  wonder  of 
His  ministry  is  that  He  proclaimed  it  in  a  way  so  differ- 
ent from  our  theories  about  Him. 

Take  the  next  book  you  happen  to  see  on  "The  Di- 
vinity of  Christ"  and  note  the  method  of  its  argument. 
First,  Jesus  was  divine  because  He  claimed  to  be  divine; 

99 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

secondly,  Jesus  must  have  been  divine  because  He 
wrought  miracles  to  prove  His  claim,  and  so  on  and  so 
on.  Now  see  how  different  was  the  method  of  Jesus. 
The  method  of  the  theologians  is  the  method  which 
Satan  proposed,  but  the  method  of  Jesus  was  that  which 
we  decided  at  the  very  outset,  that  His  career  would  not 
be  that  of  a  professional  miracle  worker.  The  wonders 
which  He  reluctantly  wrought  grew  not  out  of  His  am- 
bition, nor  were  they  primarily  an  attestation  of  His 
divinity.  Jesus  left  His  divinity  to  be  discovered  by 
men.  Flesh  and  blood  did  not  reveal  it  unto  them,  but 
the  spirit  of  God,  and  upon  the  Rock  of  that  discovery 
of  His  divinity  He  built  His  church,  because  that  truth 
was  not  founded  upon  external  signs  and  wonders,  but 
upon  the  revelation  of  the  spirit  of  God  within  their 
hearts.  The  self-revelation  of  Jesus  Christ  is  not  more 
wonderful  than  the  self-repression  of  Jesus  Christ.  His 
declaration  that  He  was  the  Son  of  God  is  in  itself  less 
wonderful  than  the  marvelous  patience  which  He 
showed  before  making  that  revelation.  The  whole  min- 
istry of  Jesus  is  a  testimony  to  the  completeness  of  His 
conquest  of  this  temptation;  and  only  those  who  them- 
selves are  in  some  place  of  promise  and  of  power,  only 
those  who  have  risen  to  a  higher  plane  than  mere  lust 
for  bread  and  have  met  the  tempter  again  and  con- 
quered him  upon  this  higher  plane,  can  truly  understand 
something  of  what  it  meant  to  Jesus. 

The  final  temptation  of  Jesus  came  in  a  vision  of 
power.  From  the  high  hill,  which  tradition  points 
out  as   the   scene  of  the   temptation,  Jesus   could   look 

100 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

across  to  the  hills  of  Moab  and  of  Edom;  toward  the 
sunset  lay  Judea  and  the  Great  Sea  with  all  the  king- 
doms of  the  world  centered  about  it.  In  imagination 
He  saw  them  all,  and  below  Him  in  plain  sight  lay 
Jericho,  the  seat  and  capital  of  Herod,  the  king.  How 
did  Herod  become  king?  Herod's  grandfather  was  a 
provincial  like  himself,  but  rose  to  be  governor  of  Idu- 
maea.  Taking  advantage  of  the  political  confusion  of 
his  time,  he  steadily  increased  his  power  till  Rome  found 
it  easier  to  come  to  terms  with  him  than  to  attempt  the 
hopeless  task  of  conquering  him  in  so  inaccessible  a 
country.  Herod,  who  now  ruled  in  this  very  city  of 
Jericho  and  bore  the  name  of  king,  was  a  man  of  only 
moderate  ability  and  reigned  in  part  by  force  of  circum- 
stances and  partly  by  making  good  use  of  favoring  con- 
ditions. Conditions  were  ripe  just  now  for  a  man  of 
ability  and  leadership  to  make  himself  a  power.  Not 
only  so,  but  the  people  were  eager  to  be  led.  The 
preaching  of  John  was  crystallizing  their  age-long  hope 
of  a  deliverer;  John  himself  would  be  the  eager  prophet 
of  such  a  movement.  John's  followers,  a  multitude  in 
number,  were  only  waiting  the  word  that  would  surely 
rally  them  around  such  a  standard  as  Jesus  could  in- 
stantly raise.  Did  the  undertaking  involve  peril?  It 
was  less  perilous  than  not  to  do  it.  It  would  be  peril- 
ous indeed  to  disappoint  such  hopes.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  it  proved  fatal  to  disappoint  them.  The  people 
rose  up  and  killed  Jesus  becavise  He  did  not  do  the  thing 
which  they  expected  Him  to  do.  To  fall  in  with  the 
eager  impulse  of  the  crowd,  to  make  the  most  of  the 

101 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

popular  movement,  this  was  the  very  real,  nay  the 
almost  overwhelming  temptation  of  the  Son  of  God. 

Did  these  temptations  make  their  appeal  to  Jesus? 
We  are  certain  that  they  made  a  very  real  appeal  to 
Him.  To  have  yielded  was  not  only  possible,  but  to  re- 
sist was  difficult  and  costly.  But  Jesus  recognized  these 
impulses  of  His  own  hunger,  pride  and  ambition  to  be 
the  temptations  of  Satan.  One  by  one  He  met  and  con- 
quered them  all.  So  fully  had  He  appropriated  the 
Spirit  of  God  that  came  on  Him  in  His  baptism. 

I  need  not  indicate  more  fully  how  like  these  tempta- 
tions are  to  our  very  own.  If  they  were  unlike  ours 
they  could  have  very  little  value  to  us.  Truly  did  the 
apostle  say  of  Him  that  "He  was  tempted  in  all  points 
like  as  we  are,  yet  without  sin."  His  temptations  are 
an  ascending  series,  a  cycle  that  parallel  our  own  ex- 
periences all  the  way  from  the  most  common-place  lust 
for  bread,  through  spiritual  pride,  ambition  and  the 
very  denial  of  his  mission.  He  was  tempted  to  make 
the  great  refusal ;  to  face  the  world  with  a  blank  athe- 
istic doubt,  to  live  on  in  a  negative  denial  of  that  which 
God  had  sent  Him  to  perform,  or  to  do  with  His  gift 
all  the  possible  things  that  might  inure  to  His  advan- 
tage. He  was  tempted  to  commit  sin  against  the  Holy 
Ghost;  that  denial  of  His  own  spiritual  power  which 
some  men  make  through  mere  indifference  and  unwill- 
ingness to  face  their  mission  as  God  would  reveal  it  to 
them.  Through  doubt,  passion,  pride,  and  power  Jesus 
rose  by  successful  conquests,  and  when  He  went  forth 
from  the  wilderness  a  new  glory  shone  from  His  face ; 

102 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

and  John  saw  Him  and  in  reverent  adoration  said  to  his 
disciples,  "Behold  the  Lamb  of  God." 

I  spent  a  Sunday  a  year  ago  in  the  home  of  Anton 
Lang  at  Oberammergau.  He  met  me  at  the  train,  and 
his  children  accompanied  him,  driving  a  little  donkey 
hitched  to  a  cart;  and  they  took  my  bag  in  the  cart. 
It  was  the  very  same  donkey  on  which  nine  years  before 
he  had  ridden  into  Jersusalem  in  the  play.  I  looked  at 
the  little,  lazy,  patient  playfellow  of  the  children,  who 
for  nine  years  had  been  petted  and  whipped  about  by 
them,  and  considered  how  in  a  few  months  he  would  be 
the  most  famous  animal  in  all  the  world.  The  donkey 
did  not  know  this,  but  Anton  Lang  did.  As  I  walked 
with  him  through  the  street,  as  I  sat  with  him  at  table, 
as  I  went  with  him  behind  the  scenes  of  the  passion- 
theater  and  he  explained  to  me  how  they  suspended 
him  from  the  cross,  and  by  what  apparatus  they  ele- 
vated him  into  heaven,  I  wondered  how  he  lived  in  his 
own  heart ;  how  he  bore  about  in  his  soul  this  conscious- 
ness that  he,  a  village  potter,  had  laid  upon  him  the 
wonderful  and  perilous  joy  of  representing  before  men 
the  passion  of  the  Son  of  God.  It  had  its  commercial 
value  to  him,  and  he  could  not  fail  to  know  it.  He  was 
working  hard  in  his  little  pottery  to  make  vases  that 
would  be  sold  a  year  later.  But  I  did  not  find  his  soul 
corroded  with  the  lust  of  gold  or  love  of  fame.  So  far 
as  1  could  judge,  he  had  kept  himself  unspotted  from  the 
manifest  temptations  of  his  position.  He  could  have  a 
thousand  dollars  a  week  in  an  American  theater;  but 
if  he  remains  true,  as  God  grant  he  may,  he  will  remain 
a  village  potter,  seeking  not  merely  to   show  the  form 

103 


THE     TEMPTATIONS     IN     THE     WILDERNESS 

and  appearance  of  the  Christ,  but  to  live  the  Christ  life 
among  his   fellow   men. 

After  all,  I  said  to  myself,  his  problem  is  not  so  very 
different  from  mine,  and  that  of  my  fellow  men.  And  it 
was  very  like  the  temptation  which  Jesus  Himself  met 
and  conquered  in  the  consciousness  that  He  was  the 
Son  of  God. 

Having  been  tempted  in  all  points  like  ourselves,  Jesus 
is  able  to  save  us  in  our  temptations.  Having  met 
Satan  on  every  plane  from  that  of  human  passion  up  to 
such  ambitions  as  have  wrought  the  ruin  of  angels,  the 
Son  of  God  stood  true. 

So  did  He  become  our  Saviour.  So  did  He  prove  true 
to  His  divine  Sonship.  And  we  as  we  meet  temptation 
with  Him,  shall  enter  into  His  possession  of  the  Sonship 
of  God,  being  heirs  of  God  and  joint-heirs  with  Jesus 
Christ. 


104 


^Ije  Morlti  to  Come 


For  unto  the  angels  hath  he  not  put  in  subjection  the 
world  to  come,  whereof  we  speak.  But  one  in  a  certain 
place  testified,  saying,  What  is  man,  that  thou  art  mindful  of 
him?  or  the  son  of  man,  that  thou  visitest  him?  Hebrews  2:  5-6 

There  are  three  great  surprises  in  this  text.  The 
first  is,  that  God  has  a  world  too  good  for  the  angels ; 
the  second  is,  that  the  world  which  is  too  good  for 
the  angels  God  is  preparing  for  men ;  the  third  is,  that  the 
world  which  is  too  good  for  angels  and  which  God  is 
preparing  for  men  is  the  world  in  which  we  live.  This 
is  one  of  the  most  wonderful  texts  in  the  whole  Bible, 
and  each  of  these  surprises  demands  consideration. 

I.  THE  FIRST  SURPRISE— God  Has  a  World  Too 
Good  for  the  Angels. 

Early  Hebrew  theology  gave  small  attention  to  angels, 
but  on  their  return  from  Babylon  the  Jewish  people 
brought  back  with  them  a  highly  developed  demonology, 
and  with  it  a  large  appreciation  of  the  sphere  and  func- 
tion of  angels.  In  time  it  came  about  that  they  con- 
ceived of  almost  every  really  important  thing  intermed- 
iate between  God  and  the  world  to  have  been  done  by 
angels.  In  fact,  it  grew  to  be  a  most  dangerous  and 
persistent  error,  shtitting  God  out  of  actual  contact  with 
His  own  world,  and  approaching  material  things  and 
even  the  soul  of  man  through  a  series  of  receding 
emanations.  It  was  a  chain  which  really  did  not  con- 
nect at  either  end ;  it  left  God  unapproachable  and  man 
inaccessible. 

105 


THE      WORLD      TO      COME 

Yet  the  doctrine  was  not  always  held  in  this  extreme 
and  untrue  form.  In  its  more  true  and  beautiful  forms 
of  statement,  it  relieved  the  isolation  of  God  and  peopled 
the  heavens  with  winged  and  jubilant  messengers,  the 
echo  of  whose  heavenly  music  sometimes  reached  the 
ears  of  men,  and  whose  unseen  presence  cheered  the 
soul,  averted  evil,  and  gave  guidance  in  hours  of  per- 
plexity or  danger. 

The  Jews  came  to  believe  that  their  law  had  been  de- 
livered to  holy  men  of  old  through  the  ministry  of 
angels.  The  author  of  the  Epistle  of  the  Hebrews 
neither  affirms  nor  denies  that  this  is  true.  He  takes  it 
for  granted  that  many  of  those  whom  he  addresses  be- 
lieve it,  and  he  undertakes  to  prove  that  even  so  the 
new  covenant  is  better  than  the  old.  He  is  writing  to 
Jews  who  honor  the  Temple,  the  priesthood,  the  sac- 
rifices, the  covenant  of  God  with  Abraham,  and  the 
Law  delivered  by  angels  unto  Moses  and  through  Moses 
to  the  people  of  Israel.  He  undertakes  to  prove  that  the 
new  covenant  is  better  than  the  old  covenant;  the  great 
High  Priest  superior  to  the  Jewish  hierarchy ;  the  one 
supreme  Sacrifice  of  God  for  human  sin  more  efficacious 
than  the  sacrifices  of  all  the  streaming,  smoking  altars 
of  the  Temple  at  Jerusalem  ;  and  he  declares  that  even 
a  law  given  by  angels — beautiful  and  sacred  as  such  a 
law  must  be — would  still  be  subordinate  to  the  word 
of  eternal  truth  and  grace  revealed  through  the  living 
Son  of  God. 

"For  unto  which  of  the  angels  said  He  at  any  time. 
Thou  art  my  Son;  this  day  have  I  begotten  thee?" 

This  is  how  the  angels  appear  in  this  interesting  and 
beautiful  argument.     They  hover  in  the  background  of 

106 


THE      WORLD      TO      COME 

this   text   with    suggestions   of   a   varied   and   beautiful 
service. 

It  can  do  us  no  harm  in  our  busy,  practical  life  if  now 
and  then  we  think  of  the  beautiful  ministry  of  the  glori- 
fied spirits  who  live  close  to  the  throne  of  God.  Our 
knowledge  of  them  is  small,  but  the  appeal  which  they 
make  to  the  enlightened  imagination  is  full  of  spiritual 
comfort.  John  Hay,  in  one  of  those  dialect  poems  which 
he  later  came  to  dislike,  told  of  the  brmging  back  to 
camp  of  the  lost  little  lad,  and  in  the  language  of  a 
rough  frontiersman  attributed  his  recovery  to  the  good- 
ness of  the  angels.  He  expressed  the  conviction  that 
"hunting  up  little  children  and  bringing  them  back  to 
their  own"  was  a  better  occupation  for  angels  than  sanc- 
tified idleness  in  heaven.  Very  likely  we  should  agree 
with  him.  We  may  be  sure  that  whatever  the  occu- 
pation of  angels,  they  are  not,  cannot  be  idle. 

II.  THE  SECOND  SURPRISE— The  World  Which 
Is  Too  Good  for  the  Angels  Is  the  World  Which  God  Is 
Preparing  for  Men. 

I  have  no  disposition  to  speak  disparagingly  of  angels, 
but  I  am  inclined  to  think  that  few  of  the  angels 
have  assigned  to  them  a  work  more  glorious  than 
God  has  even  now  entrusted  to  men.  It  is  not  wholly 
an  evidence  of  depravity  in  young  people  that  causes  a 
small  boy  to  revolt  against  singing  "I  Want  to  Be  an 
Angel."  There  is  something  to  be  said  on  behalf  of  the 
boy  who  said  he  did  not  want  to  be  an  angel  and  play 
the  harp ;  he  would  rather  be  a  stage-driver  and  beat  a 
bass  drum. 

Among  the  great  men  of  Boston  was  Father  Taylor, 

107 


THE      WORLD      TO      COME 

for  many  years  pastor  of  the  Seamen's  Bethel,  Ralph 
Waldo  Emerson,  who  had  a  genius  for  novel  classifica- 
tions, said  that  America's  greatest  poets  were  Daniel 
Webster  and  Father  Taylor. 

Father  Taylor  had  a  rare  gift  of  eloquence,  a  wit  as 
keen  as  the  edge  of  a  rapier,  and  a  heart  as  soft  as  the 
breast  of  a  dove.  A  stern  apostle  of  righteousness,  he 
was  most  considerate  of  human  frailty;  a  staunch  de- 
fender of  orthodoxy,  he  loved,  and  was  loved  by,  those 
who  did  not  accept  his  creed.  Toward  the  sailor  boys, 
his  own  boys,  he  opened  his  heart  so  wide  that  it  be- 
came to  many  of  them  a  haven  of  refuge  amid  the  storms 
of  doubt  and  passion.  Father  Taylor  lay  dying  and 
someone  whispered  in  his  ear,  "You  soon  will  be  with 
the  angels,"  but  the  strong,  old  man  roused  and  replied, 
"I  don't  want  to  be  with  the  angels;  I  want  to  stay  here 
among  folks !" 

The  Son  of  God  did  not  want  to  stay  among  angels; 
He  wanted  to  live  here  among  folks.  The  author  of 
the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  says  that  the  work  of  re- 
demption, which  made  Jesus  for  the  time  "a.  little  lower 
than  the  angels,"  crowned  Him  at  last  with  glory  and 
honor,  gave  Him  a  place  above  all  angels,  and  exalted 
all  who  have  fellowship  with  Him  into  the  rich  com- 
panionship of  His  redemptive  work. 

So,  I  am  quite  willing  other  people  should  sing,  "I 
want  to  be  an  angel."  For  myself,  I  want  to  be  a  man ; 
a  child  of  God,  and  a  joint  heir  with  Jesus  Christ,  and 
take  my  own  humble  but  reasonable  share  in  the  enter- 
prise of  God  which  this  world  represents. 

108 


THE      WORLD      TO      COME 

III.  THE  THIRD  SURPRISE— The  World  Which 
Is  Too  Good  for  Angels  and  Which  God  Is  Preparing 
for  Men  Is  the  World  in  Which  We  Live. 

What  is  the  world  to  come,  as  it  is  here  considered? 
It  is  ''the  world  to  come  whereof  we  speak ;"  that  is  to 
say,  the  world  which  the  writer  has  just  been  talking 
about.  What  world  has  he  been  talking  about?  Of 
another  planet;  of  some  part  of  heaven?  Not  at  all. 
It  is  the  world  into  which  Christ  came ;  the  world  into 
which  God  brought  His  first  beloved,  saying,  "Let  all 
the  angels  of  God  worship  Him."  There  is  no  possible 
question  which  world  he  is  talking  about.  The  world 
which  is  too  good  for  angels  and  which  God  has  prepared 
for  men,  is  this  present  world.  Yet  it  is  not  the  world 
as  it  is  at  present.  It  is  the  world  as  it  is  coming  to  be ; 
it  is  the  new  order  of  things  established  by  the  redemp- 
tive work  of  Christ;  the  world  which  is  evolving  into 
its  perfection  through  the  continuous  operation  of  the 
spirit  of  God  in  human  life.    That  is  the  world  to  come. 

Let  us  dwell  a  little  on  this  third  surprise,  for  it  is 
just  here  that  the  doctrine  makes  a  larger  demand  than 
our  limited  faith  may  prove  adequate  to  entertain. 

There  are  two  accounts  of  the  creation  of  the  world ; 
the  one  is  in  Genesis  and  the  other  in  Geology.  Apart 
from  certain  quibbles  as  to  precise  divisions  of  periods 
and  exact  order  of  events — questions  that  have  their  own 
scientific  or  theological  interest,  but  are  utterly  negligi- 
ble as  matters  of  faith — these  two  accounts  agree.  That 
is  to  say,  the  first  chapter  of  Genesis  and  the  story  which 
God  has  written  in  the  rocks  both  testify  that  this  world 
began  in  chaos  and  emerged  into  its  present  form 
through   a   series   of   progressive   and   orderly   develop- 

109 


THE      WORLD      TO      COME 

ments,  wherein  was  manifested  the  continuous  and  pa- 
tient operation  of  a  never  failing  plan.  In  the  begin- 
ning God  created  the  heaven  and  the  earth,  and  when  the 
earth  rolled  out  from  the  hand  of  God,  a  great  ball 
swinging  free  in  its  own  orbit,  the  morning  stars  sang 
together  and  the  sons  of  God  shouted  for  joy.  "And 
God  saw  that  it  was  good."  Everybody  else  thought 
it  was  complete,  but  God  said,  "Tomorrow  we  shall  have 
the  world  to  come." 

Then  God  began  again,  using  his  new  world  as  raw 
material  for  a  better  one.  Continents  emerged  and  were 
clothed  with  green ;  mountains  and  oceans  took  their 
place  upon  the  map ;  and  new  anthems  of  wonder  and 
of  praise  made  reverent  reverberation  through  celestial 
spaces,  "God  saw  that  it  was  good"  and  said,  "Tomor- 
row we  shall  see  the  world  to  come." 

Then  vegetable  life  appeared ;  great  forests  clothed  the 
earth,  and  the  continents  grew  green  beneath  the  smile 
of  God.  Again  there  was  joy  in  heaven,  and  God  smiled 
and  said,  "All  this  is  good ;  but  tomorrow  we  shall  see 
the  world  to  come." 

It  came  with  flood  and  thunder;  with  signs  and 
wonders  and  tumultuous  upheaval ;  forests  were  sub- 
merged and  the  earth  looked  like  a  wreck,  and  the 
heavenly  host  stared  on  in  fear  and  wonder.  But  the 
eye  of  God  looked  deep  into  the  heart  of  the  earth,  where 
forests  were  crystallizing  into  coal,  and  God  said,  "All 
this  is  good ;  and  tomorrow  we  shall  see  the  world  to 
come." 

After  awhile  came  man.  He  seemed  so  innocent  and 
happy,  and  the  outer  conditions  of  his  life  appeared  so 
full  of  all  that  was  attractive  and  inspiring,  that  to  this 

110 


THE      WORLD      TO      COME 

very  day  good  people  in  their  folly  look  back  to  that 
experience  and  sigh  for  conditions  such  as  surrounded 
that  first  man.  But  God  said,  "All  this  is  very  good, 
but  there  is  something  better  even  than  this.  By  and 
by,  we  shall  have  the  world  to  come." 

It  came  and,  oh,  how  sadly !  Angels  hid  their  face 
in  shame  and  seraphs  wept  in  their  disappointment  when 
man  went  forth  from  the  Garden  to  dig  a  living  and  a 
character  out  of  the  earth  and  to  discover  in  his  hand- 
to-hand  conflict  with  soil  and  climate,  with  tempest  and 
with  sin,  the  meaning  of  the  world  to  come.  But  what 
we  call  the  Fall  of  Man  was  a  part  of  the  plan  of  God. 
The  purpose  of  God  was  never  more  steadily  marching 
forward  than  when  the  angel  barred  the  gate  of  Paradise 
to  keep  man  steady  at  his  job  in  hope  of  the  world  to 
come. 

This  world  has  always  been  a  puzzle  to  the  race  that 
has  lived  upon  its  surface.  We  have  felt  ourselves 
strangers  upon  it.  It  is  our  mother,  our  bodies  are  born 
of  its  dust.  And  it  has  been  kind  to  us  and  furnished 
us  our  homes,  and  given  of  its  flowers  for  our  adornment 
and  of  its  fruit  for  our  support  and  of  its  hidden  stores 
for  our  warmth  and  wealth.  Yet  ever  have  we  felt 
lost  upon  it,  and  have  sought  in  each  other  or  in  the  in- 
vocation of  spiritual  powers  to  be  saved  from  being 
alone  upon  the  earth.  No  man  wants  the  earth.  If  he 
had  it  to  himself,  or  any  small  part  of  it,  he  would  be 
wretched.  We  want  the  earth  only  for  the  sake  of  hav- 
ing a  place  to  stand,  like  Archimedes  of  old,  and  we 
want  then  a  lever  to  move  it  out  of  our  way. 

And  the  world  as  it  has  been  has  been  such  as  to  appall 
men  and  cause  them  dread  and  fright.    Above  them  have 

111 


THE      WORLD      TO      COME 

echoed  its  thunders  and  flashed  its  lightnings,  and  upon 
them  have  beaten  its  storms.  If  one  day  they  have  re- 
joiced in  the  luxury  of  its  springtime  or  the  fruitage  of 
its  autumn,  the  next  they  have  been  parched  by  the 
heat  of  its  summer  or  chilled  by  the  blasts  of  its  win- 
ter. The  earth  has  oppressed  man  with  a  sense  of  his 
own  littleness.  He  has  felt  hopelessly  small  beneath  the 
shadow  of  its  mountains,  or  the  depths  of  its  forests  or 
on  its  boundless  prairies  or  when  tossed  on  the  waves 
of  its  oceans.  He  has  dug  a  living  from  its  bowels,  or 
fished  it  out  of  the  depths  of  its  waters,  but  ever  with 
toil  and  fear,  and  ever  in  peril  of  his  life.  Is  there  no 
return  to  Paradise;  no  recovery  of  the  joy  of  yesterday? 
None  whatever.  The  face  of  the  human  race  is  toward 
the  morrow.     We  look  for  the  world  to  come. 

This  is  the  view  also  of  Peter  in  his  second  epistle,  where 
the  world,  as  it  then  was,  is  contrasted  with  the  world  before 
the  flood,  and  is  contrasted  also  with  the  golden  age  that 
was  to  follow  the  gathering  up  of  the  heavens.  It  is  the  view 
of  Paul  in  his  wonderful  8th  of  Romans.  It  is  the  concep- 
tion of  John  in  his  vision  of  the  Holy  City  descended  to 
abide  on  earth. 

The  world,  as  it  is,  stands  always  in  contrast  to  the 
world  that  is  to  come,  because  there  is  always  a  world  to 
come.  God's  method  is  one  of  unlimited  progress.  When 
the  fire  comes,  and  the  elements  melt  with  fervent  heat, 
there  is  ever  a  chariot.  When  the  flood  comes  there  is  ever 
an  ark,  and  there  is  always  a  rainbow  that  promises  that 
that  event  shall  have  no  repetition.  There  is  assurance 
with  every  change  that  a  permanent  advance  has  been 
marked.     God  has  many  kinds  of  flood,  and  the  old  is  ever 

112 


THE      WORLD      TO      COME 

passing  away,  but  its  noblest  fruitage  saved  as  material 
for  God's  next  venture. 

It  is  probable  that  the  world  has  never  been  so  near  to 
God's  ideal  as  now.  Man's  real  progress  did  not  begin  till 
he  got  outside  of  Eden.  Men  have  looked  back  to  it  with 
longing.  So  did  they  to  Egypt  and  its  flesh  pots.  But 
the  wilderness,  with  all  its  drought  and  serpents,  was  better 
than  the  sheltered  bounty  of  Egypt ;  and  the  world,  with 
its  temptations  and  toils  and  sorrows  and  sins,  through 
which  we  are  working  out  the  coming  of  the  world  that 
God  wants,  is  better  than  any  paradise,  where  men  maintain 
unstable  equilibrium  in  weak  and  untried  innocence,  that 
is  good  only  because  it  knows  not  how  to  be  bad. 

The  world  has  much  raw  material  gathered  in  the  course 
of  centuries  for  the  making  of  the  world  to  come.  Tt  has 
so  far  subdued  earth  as  to  make  cities  grow  where  there 
were  wastes ;  to  make  parks  that  promote  health  and  bless- 
ings where  there  were  malarial  swamps  ;  to  change  measur- 
ably the  face  of  nature  in  the  removal  of  forests  for  the 
building  of  homes ;  in  the  digging  of  mines,  in  the  exalting 
of  the  valleys  and  laying  low  the  mountains  and  hills. 

And  it  has  made  moral  progress.  The  thirst  for  knowl- 
edge, the  remorse  for  sin,  the  love  of  honor  and  beauty, 
the  aspiration  after  that  which  is  better  than  we  have  had 
or  been,  the  love  that  can  suffer  and  be  Brave — all  these 
show  how  much  better  is  man  than  mere  animal  and 
how  much  material  there  is  in  what  we  call  the  natural 
man,  out  of  which  to  make  the  spiritual  man.  God  always 
makes  things  out  of  others  that  he  has  previously  made. 
Poor  material  as  men  are.  He  can  make  of  them  something 
better  than  angels  and  because  God  is  creating  the  man  that 
is  to  come.  He  is  creating  for  him  and  through  him,  the 
world  to  come. 

113 


THE      WORLD      TO      COME 

There  are  good  people  who  hold  as  the  very  essence 
of  their  faith  that  man's  lost  Paradise  must  come  back 
to  him  again ;  that  God  is  somehow,  sometime  to  take 
a  backward  step  and  restore  something  on  which  human- 
ity long  since  turned  its  reluctant  back.  But  that  is  not 
the  message  of  history,  nor  is  it  the  message  of  the 
Bible;  not  backward,  but  before  us  is  the  future  of  the 
human  race.  Eye  hath  not  seen  nor  ear  heard,  neither 
hath  entered  into  the  heart  of  man  what  God  is  even 
now  preparing  for  those  who  love  Him. 

Here  is  the  world  for  which  Christ  died.  It  requires 
a  very  meager  faith  to  prophesy  a  heaven  in  which  all 
shall  be  made  right  that  so  puzzles  us  here,  but  it  re- 
quires a  great  vigorous  faith  and  a  sanctified  imagina- 
tion to  affirm  that  here  and  now  God  is  working  out  a 
great  future  in  the  human  race  and  that  the  kingdom  of 
God  is  not  only  to  come,  but  even  now  is  coming. 

"As  in  those  blindfold  years,  long  passed  away, 

Men  held  the  earth  a  plain  with  boundaries, 

And  met  with  hatred  sages  grown  more  wise. 

Who  would  have  taught  them  whence  came  night  and  day; 

So  only  souls  who  in  thick  darkness  move 

Set  man-made  limits  to  Eternal  Love!" 

God  has  other  worlds  to  come.  I  do  not  know  where 
they  are  nor  how  many.  'l  am  confident  they  are  all  good 
worlds.  I  do  not  believe  that  God  is  ultimately  to  have 
any  worlds  that  are  not  good  worlds.  There  are  to  be  new 
heavens  as  well  as  new  earth.  Every  new  earth  compels  a 
new  heaven.  Every  new  political  economy  requires  a  new 
theology.  Every  advance  of  man  compels  us  to  believe  in 
a  greater  God.  And  this  must  be  in  all  the  world  to  come. 

114 


THE      WORLD      TO      COME 

I  have  spoken  of  only  one  world  to  come,  this  present 
world.  But  I  am  sure  the  others  are  for  us.  And  I  have  a 
vision  now  and  then  of  what  those  worlds  must  be  which 
makes  me  confident  that  to  one  who  lives  in  this  world  as 
he  ought,  and  who  helps  roll  it  on  into  the  sunlight  of  God, 
it  will  be  no  strange  or  startling  thing  to  find  himself  a  resi- 
dent of  heaven. 

"When  we've  been  there  ten  thousand  years, 

Bright  shining  as  the  sun, 
We've  no  less  days  to  sing  God's  praise 

Than  when   we   first  begun." 

But  we  shall  not  do  all  our  singing  in  any  one  heaven. 
When  we've  been  there  ten  thousand  years,  or  more  years 
or  less,  I  would  not  venture  to  guess  how  many,  we  shall 
wake  some  glad  celestial  morning  to  other  and  wonderful 
surprises. 

When  we  have  lived  in  heaven  just  long  enough,  and  not 
a  day  too  long,  we  shall  rise  some  morning  to  meet  the  joys 
of  a  new  glad  day,  and  shall  hear  some  beautiful  messen- 
ger from  the  Father  saying  to  us,  **I  am  glad  you  have 
enjoyed  this  beautiful  heaven:  but  this  is  not  the  only  one, 
nor  yet  the  best.  Come,  let  us  go  on,  and  discover  the 
world  to  come!" 


115 


Cije  Bibme  Beposiit 


But  all  things  are  of  God,  who  reconciled  us  to  himself 
through  Christ,  and  gave  unto  us  the  ministry  of  reconciliation; 
to  wit,  that  God  was  in  Christ  reconciling  the  world  unto  him- 
self, not  reckoning  unto  them  their  trespasses,  and  having  com- 
mitted unto  us  the  word  of  reconciliation.    2  Corinthians,  5:18-19. 

In  these  two  verses  it  is  twice  afifirmed  that  the  mission  of 
God  in  Christ  was  a  mission  of  reconciliation.  God  was  in 
Christ,  reconciHng  the  world  to  Himself.  There  is  in  that 
simple  affirmation  a  whole  doctrine  of  the  Incarnation  and 
of  the  Atonement.  Notice  that  it  does  not  say  that  God 
came  in  Christ  for  the  purpose  of  reconciling  Himself  to  the 
world.  Neither  here  nor  anywhere  else  in  Scripture  is  any 
such  thing  as  that  declared.  Men  have  been  very  bold  in 
forming  their  theories  as  if  it  were  God  who  needed  to 
be  reconciled;  but  what  the  New  Testament  teaches  is 
that  it  is  man  who  needs  to  be  reconciled  to  God.  This 
text  says  so  very  plainly,  and  says  it  twice. 

But  the  text  also  makes  another  important  statement, 
and  that  relates  to  the  manner  in  which  God  is  making  the 
work  of  Jesus  effective  in  human  life.  God  who  set  forth 
this  mission  in  Christ  "gave  to  us  the  ministry  of  reconcil- 
iation;" and  this  affirmation,  also  is  repeated,  namely,  that 
God  has  "committed  unto  us  the  word  of  reconciliation." 
You  will  note  that  the  margin  of  the  American  revision 
says  "placed  in  us ;"  and  it  might  very  properly  have  been 
translated  that  God  has  "deposited  in  us  the  word  of  recon- 
ciliation." 

It  is  this  deposit  about  which  I  want  to  speak.  You  will 
note  again  that  the  nature  of  the  deposit  is  twice  defined, 

116 


THE      DIVINE      DEPOSIT 


and  the  fact  is  twice  affirmed ;  both  repetitions  relate  to 
this  deposit. 

One  of  the  sayings  which  Origen  and  many  of  the  early 
Christian  fathers  believed  to  have  come  from  the  lips  of 
Jesus,  though  not  contained  in  the  Gospels,  was  "Prove 
yourselves  tried  bankers."  By  this  they  understood  Jesus 
to  have  meant  two  things :  first  that  we  should  be  able 
to  distinguish  between  that  which  is  true  and  that  which  is 
counterfeit ;  and  secondly  that  we  should  prove  worthy  of 
our  trust.  Whether  in  the  special  form  of  this  saying  or 
not,  Jesus  certainly  taught  both  these  lessons. 

Yet  do  not  mistake  the  lessons  of  this  text  by  supposing 
that  what  is  referred  to  as  deposited  with  us  is  what  we 
call  our  talents.  What  the  text  affirms  the  Lord  has  de- 
posited with  us  is  more  than  our  personal  gifts  and  graces. 
It  is  something  vastly  larger  than  what  we  are  accustomed 
to  think  of  as  the  divine  investment  in  our  lives. 

What  is  this  deposit  of  which  Paul  speaks? 

In  the  first  place,  it  is  the  apostolic  testimony  to  Jesus. 
It  is  what  the  first  disciples  saw  and  heard  and  felt  when 
they  were  with  Him,  and  which  they  promised  sacredly 
should  never  be  forgotten  by  men  living  in  the  world. 
They  did  not  contemplate  a  written  Gospel.  They  merely 
told  people  what  they  had  seen  and  heard  of  Jesus.  They 
had  no  printing  presses  to  destroy  their  memories  or  make 
their  personal  testimony  seem  superfluous.  We  have 
printed  Bibles,  and  not  only  that  but  concordances  and 
other  modern  apparatus,  by  means  of  which  we  relieve  our- 
selves from  the  necessity  of  even  knowing,  much  less  of 
telling  very  much  about  Jesus.  The  early  apostles,  I  think, 
would  have  said  it  were  better  for  the  Bible  never  to  be 
printed  in  a  book  if  the  result  were  to  be  the  losing  of  it 

117 


THE      DIVINE      DEPOSIT 


out  of  the  lives  and  hearts  and  memories  of  men.  They 
did  not  expect  a  salaried  ministry  to  preach  for  them  and 
pray  for  them  and  save  them  the  trouble  of  preaching  and 
praying  for  themselves.  They  had  no  such  notion  as  we 
have  acquired  of  a  clergy  whose  business  it  is  to  make  it 
unnecessary  for  the  laity  to  possess  and  to  repeat  the  ex- 
perience of  their  own  hearts.  They  expected  that  it  would 
continue  to  be  necessary  for  every  generation  to  tell  people 
about  Jesus.  And  they  were  right.  It  is  necessary.  We 
need  a  campaign  of  personal  testimony.  A  printed  Bible, 
a  professional  clergy,  are  not  ends  in  themselves ;  they 
may  indeed  defeat  the  very  end  for  which  they  are  de- 
vised. The  living  voice  of  testimony  to  the  loving  power 
of  God  to  save  men  from  sin  in  Jesus  Christ — this  is  the 
deposit  which  belongs  to  us. 

But  in  the  next  place  this  deposit  is  sound  doctrine  as 
distinguished  from  error.  To  keep  the  testimony  of  Jesus 
pure  was  the  ambition  of  his  followers.  From  their  words 
and  lives  men  must  know  of  Jesus ;  the  world  would  ap- 
prove or  condemn  Jesus  as  the  world  knew  Him  in  his 
followers.  "O  Timothy,  guard  the  deposit!"  wrote  Paul 
(I  Tim.  6:20).  He  wrote  of  sound  doctrine,  of  the  simple 
truth  as  it  was  in  Jesus. 

These  two  things  the  apostles  meant  when  they  talked  of 
the  ministry  of  reconciliation  as  deposited  with  us.  It  is 
not  our  own  to  keep ;  it  is  not  given  us  as  an  exclusive  gift, 
whose  benefits  are  to  terminate  upon  ourselves ;  it  is  a 
deposit,  a  sacred  trust,  to  be  kept  pure  and  passed  on.  It 
is  not  merely  a  fixed  and  stable  body  of  truth ;  it  is  a 
growing  body  of  experience.  It  is  not  a  sacred  relic  of  the 
past ;  it  is  the  living  witness  of  the  present.  It  is  not  to 
be  hoarded  but  used;     not  buried  but  invested;     not  hid 

118 


THE      DIVINE      DEPOSIT 


within  the  heart  but  spoken  by  the  Hps  and  lived  in  the  Hfe. 
That  is  the  divine  deposit. 

It  is  the  most  precious  thing  God  has.  It  is  the  ministry 
of  reconcihation  for  which  God  revealed  Himself  in 
Christ.  Nothing  less  than  this  is  what  He  has  deposited 
with  us.  It  is  this  that  is  to  save  coming  generations,  the 
living  power  of  Jesus  transmitted  through  our  fidelity. 

Think  of  the  honor  of  it !  Think  of  the  courage  of  God 
in  devising  such  a  plan !  Think  of  the  trust  we  bear ! 
Every  man  and  woman  of  us  ought  to  grow  a  head  taller 
as  we  stand  to  our  full  height  in  the  dignity  of  this  trust. 
What  other  trust  could  possibly  be  so  great?  All  that  God 
invested  in  the  world  in  Christ  He  has  deposited  with  us! 

No  one  other  than  God  would  have  trusted  us  so  fully ; 
and  none  other  knew  us  so  well.  I  grow  in  my  esteem 
when  I  remember  that  God  would  not  have  trusted  me 
if  He  had  not  believed  me  trustworthy.  And  I  resolve 
to  be  worthy  of  His  trust. 

When  a  bank  fails,  it  is  not  the  stock-holders  whose  in- 
terests are  first  attended  to.  The  law  says,  and  it  is  just, 
that  these  may  be  required  to  lose  all,  and  then  add  as  much 
more ;  but  the  depositors  must  not  lose  a  penny.  So  sacred 
a  thing  in  the  eyes  of  the  law  is  a  deposit. 

Yes,  and  men  have  died  for  such  trust.  Some  years 
ago  a  mill  located  on  the  West  side  of  Chicago  fell  down. 
I  remember  for  months,  yes  for  years  afterwards,  the  great 
gap  in  the  buildings  showed  from  the  elevated  cars.  When 
the  floors  fell  in,  the  cashier  was  buried  in  the  ruins.  They 
found  him  at  the  door  of  the  safe,  having  made  secure  the 
money  and  accounts  before  he  attempted  to  save  his  own 
life.  Do  not  make  the  mistake  of  saying  that  such  a  man 
dies  to  save  the  money  or  the  account  books.     If  that  were 

119 


THE      DIVINE      DEPOSIT 


all,  it  would  be  his  duty  to  run  and  save  his  own  life. 
When  such  a  man  dies,  he  dies  for  a  great  ideal,  the  ideal 
of  fidelity  to  trust.  It  would  be  a  libel  to  say  "He  died 
to  save  the  firm's  money."  He  died  to  make  good  the 
sacred  trust  deposited  in  him. 

Now  here  is  the  most  sacred  trust  which  ever  was  given 
to  men.  That  which  God  revealed  in  Christ,  the  ministry 
of  reconciling  the  world  to  Himself,  He  has  committed  to 
us  in  the  assurance  of  a  great  and  beautiful  trust.  My 
brother,  shall  we  not  aspire  to  be  worthy  of  the  confidence 
of  God? 

There  is  just  one  other  thought  which  I  must  bring  to 
you.  We  have  deposited' something  with  God.  Our  faith 
that  He  is  good ;  our  belief  that  Jesus  Christ  has  brought 
God's  saving  love  to  our  very  hearts'  doors ;  our  hope  for 
this  life  and  the  life  to  come — all  these  represent  our  trust 
reposed  in  God.  On  this  trust  the  same  Apostle  Paul 
has  a  fine  word  of  assurance  for  us.  Considering  the 
magnitude  of  that  which  he  has  so  entrusted — the  sum  of 
his  spiritual  assets  for  this  world  and  the  world  to  come — 
he  says,  'T  know  Him  whom  I  have  believed ;  and  am  per- 
suaded that  He  is  able  to  guard  that  which  I  have  deposited 
with  Him,  against  that  day." 

God  will  not  fail  us ;    let  us  not  fail  God. 


120 


tKlje  (§\ovp  of  Jfatf)er!)oob 

In  Emporia,  Kansas,  lives  a  newspaper  genius  named 
Walt  Mason,  who  disguises  his  verse  as  prose.  A  few 
days  ago  he  published  the  following  jingle: 

"Last  eve  I  sought  the  church  and  heard  a  gifted 
pastor  preach  the  Word.  He  talked  of  men  whose  days 
were  o'er  two  thousand  years  ago  or  more.  He  talked 
of  kings  whose  bones  were  dust,  whose  sceptres  were 
reduced  to  rust  so  long  ago  their  stories  seem  like  frag- 
ments of  a  summer  dream.  He  said  no  word  of  those 
who  strive  in  this  old  world,  intense,  alive,  who  fight 
their  battles  every  day,  obscurely,  in  their  feeble  way. 
I'd  just  as  soon  be  in  the  dark  concerning  Father  Noah's 
ark ;  I  care  not  for  the  tents  of  Baal,  or  Joseph's  corn, 
or  Jonah's  whale ;  I  want  to  hear  my  pastor  talk  about 
the  people  on  this  block,  whose  lives  are  full  of  stings 
and  smarts,  whose  problems  often  break  their  hearts. 
I'd  rather  learn  some  way  to  cheer  some  hopeless  toiler 
struggling  here,  than  learn  how  Pharaoh  blew  his  dough 
about  five  thousand  years  ago.  The  dust  of  kings  in 
ancient  ground  is  worth  a  half  a  cent  a  pound ;  and 
Ashur's  widows'  tears  were  dried  before  old  Julius  Caesar 
died ;  the  things  of  which  my  pastor  talks  are  dead  as 
Adam's  brindled  ox,  but  all  around  us  there  are  cries, 
and  wringing  hands  and  weeping  eyes.  He'll  have  to 
get  his  text  on  straight,  and  bring  his  gospel  up  to  date." 

I  have  my  own  interest  in  archeology,  and  believe  that 
the  past  has  lessons  for  the  present.  There  are  times 
when  I  preach  about  some  of  the  topics  condemned  in 
this  poem.  But  today  I  want  to  talk  "about  the  people 
in  this  block."  T  invite  your  attention  to  a  neglected 
theme. 

121 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 


THE  GLORY  OF  FATHERHOOD 


''After  this  manner,  therefore,  pray  ye:  Our  Father  which 
art  in  heaven.  Hallowed  be  Thy  name."     Matthew  6:9. 

This  verse  is  a  wonderful  tribute  to  the  character  of 
the  boyhood  home  of  Jesus.  We  have  been  very  timid 
and  fearful  lest  if  we  speak  of  Joseph  in  his  putative 
relation  to  Jesus  we  shall  be  understood  as  denying- 
some  essential  doctrine  of  the  Divinity  of  Christ.  Such 
a  fear  is  cowardly  and  unworthy,  and  has  prevented  us 
from  doing  justice  to  one  of  the  world's  rare  heroes. 

With  questions  of  controversy  we  have  no  present 
dealing.  We  are  assuming  that  Jesus  was,  as  He  claimed 
to  be,  the  Son  of  God  and  the  Son  of  Man ;  but  in  what- 
ever way  Jesus  was  born  into  the  world,  there  was  a 
man  who  stood  to  him  in  the  legal  relation  of  father. 
It  was  Joseph's  willingness  to  stand  in  that  relation  that 
saved  Mary  from  unmerited  reproach ;  and  out  of  that 
relation  grew  very  many  wonderful  and  significant  facts, 
which  we  have  almost  overlooked  in  our  study  of  the 
Gospels.  Whatever  may  now  be  necessary  for  the 
purposes  of  Christian  doctrine,  it  was  necessary  for  the 
Jewish  law  that  the  ancestral  line  of  Jesus  should  be 
traced  through  Joseph,  and  both  the  Gospel  genealogies 
so  trace  it.  Jesus  was  born  into  a  home,  the  home  of  a 
happily  married  man  and  woman.  Hilary  taught  Him  to 
call  Joseph,  father,  and  said  to  Him,  "Thy  father  and 
I  have  sought  Thee  sorrowing."  Other  people  called 
Joseph  his  father.  "Is  not  this  Joseph's  son?"  they 
asked.  Even  the  disciples  came  to  Him,  saying,  "We 
have  found  Him  of  Avhom  Moses  and  the  prophets  did 

122 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

write,  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  the  son  of  Joseph/'  We  have 
no  reason  to  suppose  that  any  of  the  disciples  thought 
otherwise. 

These  passages  do  not  prove  anything  concerning  the 
technical  doctrine  of  the  Incarnation,  but  they  do  prove 
a  great  deal  concerning  the  moral  and  spiritual  value  of 
the  relationship  of  Jesus  and  Joseph. 

When  Jesus  said,  "After  this  manner  pray  ye:  Our 
Father  which  art  in  heaven,  Hallowed  be  Thy  name," 
He  paid  a  wonderful  tribute  to  the  home  in  which  He 
had  spent  his  boyhood.  The  people  to  whom  He  spoke 
knew  what  kind  of  a  home  that  had  been.  He  could 
hardly  have  used  that  name  for  God  if  there  had  not  lain 
behind  Him  the  memory  of  a  beautiful,  sweet  home 
life.  The  people  to  whom  He  spoke  could  hardly  have 
understood  Him  if  they  had  known  that  Joseph  com- 
pletely failed  in  the  relation  of  fatherhood.  Joseph,  the 
carpenter  of  Nazareth,  contributed  to  the  boyhood  of 
Jesus  a  background  which  enabled  Him  to  give  to  the 
world  the  dearest  of  all  names  for  God.  The  sweetest, 
tenderest,  holiest  name  which  man  in  his  need  has  ever 
breathed  into  the  ear  of  infinite  compassion  grew  more 
or  less  directly  out  of  the  fidelity  of  a  humble  carpenter 
of  Nazareth. 

Do  not  be  afraid  of  esteeming  Joseph  too  highly.  He- 
was  a  knightly,  chivalrous  gentleman,  with  an  unstained 
name  and  a  strong  arm  with  w-hich  he  sheltered  the 
good  name  of  a  virtuous  but  maligned  woman.  In  one 
of  his  most  subtle  poems,  "Count  Gismond,"  Browning 
puts  into  the  lips  of  a  woman  speaking  to  her  friend  out 
of  the  bitter-sweet  memories  of  years  long  past,  the 
story  of  the  knight   who   rose   as   her  champion   in   the 

123 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

hour   when    envy   and    bitter   hatred   cast   a    stain   upon 
her  name.    Remembering  his  fine  courage  she  prayed: 

■'Christ,    God,   who   savest   men,    save   most 
Of  men,   Count  Gismond,  who  saved  me." 

Count    Gismond,    buckHng    on    his    armor    and    riding 

full  tilt  to  unhorse  and  slay  the  slanderer,  was  not  more 

knightly,   not  more  an  unsullied  hero  without  fear  and 

•  without  reproach  than  Joseph,  the  carpenter  of  Nazareth. 

For  Jesus'  sake  he  moved  to  Egypt,  and  was  skillful 
enough  at  his  trade  to  earn  an  honest  living  there,  and 
when  he  returned  to  Nazareth  his  honest  workmanship 
was  not  yet  forgotten  and  he  found  his  place  again  in 
the  life  of  the  community  and  earned  the  bread  that 
nourished  the  little  boy.  He  taught  that  boy  to  read  and 
spell,  and  made  Him  master  of  a  trade  and  told  Him 
tales  of  the  heroes  of  his  nation,  and  quickened  within 
Him  the  ardor  of  his  radiant  young  soul.  This  was 
the  man  to  whom  Jesus  looked  back  with  happ}'  and 
honored  memories.  Through  Joseph  He  knew  what 
fatherhood  deserved  to  mean  in  courage  and  capability, 
in  strength  of  arm  and  tenderness  of  heart.  In  all  that 
went  into  making  of  simple  manliness  and  generous  com- 
passion Jesus  learned  fatherhood  from  Joseph ;  and  He 
taught  his  disciples  to  pray  to  God  and  say.  "Our 
Father." 

Had  his  childhood  been  one  of  cruel  beatings,  or  harsh 
and  unreasonable  scoldings,  and  constant,  unsympathetic 
nagging,  should  we  ever  have  known  the  name  by  which 
we  now  call  God?  Whenever  we  pray  to  God  and  call 
Him  by  the  name  Jesus  taught,  what  an  unconscious 
testimony  we  unconsciously  bear  to  the  character  of 
that  humble  but  great  man  whom  Jesus  called  father! 

124 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

Since  the  day  in  which  Jesus  taught  his  disciples  to 
pray  the  words  of  the  Lord's  Prayer,  He  has  compelled 
every  father,  good  or  bad,  to  assume  this  tremendous 
responsibility,,  of  representing  God  in  the  terms  of  his 
own  fatherhood.  In  proportion  as  any  man  exalts  the 
ideal  of  fatherhood,  God  is  honored  in  him ;  in  propor- 
tion as  he  dishonors  that  ideal,  God  suffers  in  his  mis- 
representation. He  has  no  choice  whether  he  shall  thus 
represent  God  or  not :  he  may  choose  only  how  worthily 
or  how  unworthily  he  shall  represent  Him. 

The  glory  of  fatherhood  is  a  neglected  theme  among 
us.  There  are  lands  and  there  have  been  ages  in  which 
men  have  gloried  in  their  fathers,  but  we  are  living  in 
an  age  when  men  obliterated  themselves  in  those  qual- 
ities which  hold  them  up  to  personal  esteem  on  the 
part  of  those  nearest  to  them.  Men  seek  to  be  known 
to  the  world  as  great  financiers,  as  captains  of  industry, 
as  men  who  bring  things  to  pass ;  but  for  those  elements 
which  go  to  the  making  of  the  lives  of  the  new  genera- 
tion they  all  too  willingly  concede  the  labor  and  the 
glory  to  their  wives.  Suppose  you  wished  to  buy  for 
some  friends  at  Christmas  time  a  book  on  "The  Glories 
of  Fatherhood."  You  could  not  find  such  a  book.  You 
could  find  a  hundred  books  that  glorify  motherhood, 
but  no  man  has  the  courage  to  write  a  book  on  the  dig- 
nity of  fatherhood,  and  if  he  were  to  write  it  no  one 
would  buy  it. 

"Mother,  Home  and  Heaven"  is  a  title  which  would 
sell  most  any  book.  Someone  has  proposed  as  a  satire, 
"Father,  the  Club  and  Hades."  The  name  father  does 
not  inspire  such  holy  associations  as  it  deserves  to  in- 
spire in  the  hearts  of  men  and  women. 

125 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

We  are  living  in  an  age  in  which  men  measure  their 
civilization  by  their  esteem  for  womanhood.  It  is  a  good 
measure,  too.  All  good  men  honor  women,  and  so, 
thank  God,  do  most  bad  men.  And  men  are  trying  to 
say  as  good  things  as  they  know  how  about  women, 
and  women  are  holding  conventions  and  lauding  women. 
The  bouquets  are  largely  going  one  way.  Men  in  their 
mass  meetings  never  introduce  resolutions  lauding  man 
as  man ;  the  man  who  introduced  such  a  resolution  would 
be  laughed  out  of  the  room.  But  women  owe  to  men 
as  men  a  reverence  different  from,  but  just  as  sincere, 
as  that  which  men  gladly  pay  to  women.  There  ought 
to  be  genuine  reciprocity  of  esteem  and  honor.  Woman 
owes  man  honor,  and  man  owes  woman  honor.  It  must 
not  be  all  upon  one  side. 

If  we  want  to  discover  to  Avhat  an  abyss  of  mawkish 
sentiment  this  present  one-sided  tendency  can  take  us, 
we  shall  find  it  in  the  utterances  of  those  silly  people 
who  insist  upon  talking  on  "the  motherhood  of  God." 
To  such  inanity  and  vapidity  has  our  thought  of  the 
holiness  of  fatherhood  descended. 

We  are  not  the  first  to  have  done  this.  The  men 
of  the  Middle  Ages  found  need  of  the  intercession  of 
the  Virgin  Mary,  because  they  made  their  God  an  irre- 
sponsible demon,  malignant  and  revengeful,  full  of  arbi- 
trary wrath ;  and  they  even  froze  compassion  out  of  the 
heart  of  Christ. 

l\Ien  forgot  the  brotherhood  of  Christ,  and  so  forgot 
the  fatherhood  of  God.  They  thought  of  Christ  either 
as  a  babe  in  the  arms  of  Mary,  or  as  a  victim  nailed 
to  the  cross,  or  as  a  wrathful  judge  come  to  slay  his 
enemies,    not    as    a    Brother,    Companion    and    Saviour. 

126 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

When  the  great  truth  of  the  brotherhood  of  Christ  van- 
ished from  the  hearts  of  men,  the  truth  of  the  father- 
hood of  God  went  also ;  and  men  invented  a  "mother  of 
God"  to  save  God's  children  from  the  wrath  of  their 
Father.  Fatherhood  suffered  immeasurably  by  reason 
of  the  doctrine,  and  it  suffers  still,  and  will  suffer  until 
we  restore  the  thought  of  fatherhood  to  where  it  belongs. 

All  names  of  God  are  symbolic ;  no  name  can  fully  ex- 
press the  whole  of  God.  If  any  name  expresses  truth- 
fully some  single  attribute  of  God  in  terms  that  are 
pure  and  sweet  to  us,  that  name  justifies  itself,  whatever 
it  be.  It  is  the  business  of  the  men  of  this  world  to 
elevate  their  conception  of  human  fatherhood  to  a  plane 
where  they  can  call  God,  Father,  without  blushing. 

It  is  my  firm  conviction  that  there  is  no  one  need 
of  the  present  time  greater  than  the  establishment  of  a 
new  ideal  of  fatherhood.  I  am  not  unsympathetic  toward 
the  advance  of  woman  in  material  prosperity,  in  social 
independence  or  in  individual  attainment.  All  these 
things  are  good  in  themselves ;  whether  they  are  good 
in  their  relation  to  the  needs  of  society  as  a  whole,  may 
not  always  be  so  certain.  So  far  as  I  have  ever  been 
conservative  in  the  matter  of  the  growing  liberty  and 
the  larger  life  of  woman,  it  has  not  been  through  any 
lack  of  sympathy  with  aspiring  womanhood,  but  only 
by  reason  of  some  questions  or  misgiving  as  to  what 
these  might  come  to  mean  in  their  relation  and  pro- 
portion to  certain  other  equally  valuable  assets  of  so- 
ciety. 

The  home  is  the  most  precious  thing  we  have  on 
earth.  Even  the  State  and  the  Church  are  second  to  it 
in  inherent  worth ;  the  family  is  the  oldest  and  holiest 

127 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

of  all  institutions.  We  are  rightly  taught  concerning 
it,  that  it  is  "an  holy  estate,  instituted  of  God  in  man's 
innocency,"  signifying  to  us  the  mystical  union  of  Christ 
and  the  Church.  It  is  to  me  a  profoundly  significant 
fact  that  the  first  miracle,  which  Jesus  wrought  in  Cana 
of  Galilee,  was  performed  as  a  part  of  the  service  of  re- 
joicing which  consecrated  a  new  home. 

Every  man  ought  to  be  the  head  of  his  house.  This 
does  not  mean  that  he  should  uniformly  or  arbitrarily 
liave  his  own  way.  Only  by  mutual  concessions,  only 
by  much  reciprocal  giving  and  taking,  forgiving  and 
forgetting,  can  the  perfect  home  be  maintained.  But 
there  come  times  when  questions  cannot  be  left  in  per- 
petual suspense ;  times  when  someone  must  speak  the 
authoritative  word,  and  it  is  just  and  right  that  that 
word  be  spoken  by  the  father.  Sweet,  gracious  and 
wonderful  as  is  the  authority  of  the  mother,  hers  is 
rarely,  when  at  its  best,  the  authority  or  final  dictation. 
Credited  though  she  be  with  "having  the  last  word," 
the  last  word  is  really  seldom  hers  to  say.  Even  though 
the  last  word  be  an  assent  to  what  she  wishes,  that  last 
word  should  be  spoken  by  the  husband  and  the  father. 

We  need  a  new  affirmation  of  the  dignity  and  suprem- 
acy of  manhood ;  we  need  to  deliver  ourselves  from  the 
utterly  indefensible  notion  that  while  the  feminine  ele- 
ment in  the  home  is  sw'eet  and  pure,  there  is  something 
inherently  gross  in  its  masculine  complement.  Neither 
in  Scripture  nor  in  human  life  is  there  any  justification 
for  the  notion  that  while  motherhood  is  holy,  fatherhood 
falls  inherently  to  a  lower  level,  or  that  the  essential 
nature  of  fatherhood  resides  in  the  fiesh,  while  that  of 
motherhood   belongs   in   the   sphere   of   the   spirit.     The 

.       128 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

glory  of  fatherhood  has  been  wronged,  maligned  and 
treated  with  unmerited  contempt.  A  procession  of  toil- 
ing  men,  earning  their  living  by  the  sweat  of  their  brow 
and  working  too  hard  that  their  wives  and  children  might 
work  less  than  was  good  for  them,  has  marched  home, 
weary  from  their  day's  labor,  to  the  strains  of  some- 
body's phonograph  singing,  "Everybody  Works  But 
Father."  It  is  one  of  the  outrages  of  our  contemporary 
life,  growing  out  of  a  mawkish,  unwholesome  and  in- 
consistent sense  of  chivalry  to  woman ;  and  it  has  de- 
throned our  conception  of  the  glory  of  fatherhood,  human 
and  divine. 

Every  man  should  be  a  priest  in  his  own  house.  Even 
if  he  is  not  a  very  good  man ;  even  if  he  is  not  a  pro- 
fessing Christian,  even  if  he  can  frame  no  prayer  of  his 
own,  he  should  stand  the  representative  of  the  unity  of 
the  home,  as  the  minister  of  Christ  in  the  service  of 
family  devotion.  There  ought  to  be  family  prayers  in 
every  home,  and  the  father  should  oflfer  those  prayers, 
even  if  he  be  not  a  very  good  father.  Few  fathers  would 
pray  a  wilfully  sinful  prayer  in  the  presence  of  their 
children. 

I  have  said  a  score  of  times,  and  say  again,  what  I 
believe  to  be  profoundly  true,  that  a  country  which  has 
no  standing  army  needs  more  than  other  countries  the 
element  of  manhood  in  its  educational  system.  Nations 
which  take  every  boy  at  the  age  of  i6  or  i8  and  keep  him 
for  two  or  three  years  in  military  life,  subject  to  the 
orders  of  men  and  with  the  ideals  of  manhood  before 
him,  do  something  for  their  young  men  that  cannot  be 
done  in  countries  whose  public  schools  and  Sunday 
schools  are  so  largely  taught  by  women,  and  in  whose 

129 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

homes  the  father  is  very  nearly  a  stranger.  In  my  judg- 
ment it  is  one  of  the  growing  needs  of  the  present  day, 
that  we  should  set  ourselves  to  work  with  all  diligence 
to  glorify  anew  the  thought  of  fatherhood  in  all  that 
fatherhood  implies,  and  by  a  constant  and  untiring  effort 
enlarge  the  element  of  manhood  which  enters  into  the 
influences  forming  the  characters  of  both  our  boys  and 
our  girls. 

Girls  have  quite  as  much  need  of  a  father  as  boys 
have.  Girls  ought  not  to  get  their  ideals  of  manhood 
wholly  from  the  boys  of  their  own  age,  nor  yet  from 
reading  novels,  nor  from  the  stage.  As  truly  as  a  boy 
needs  a  mother,  a  girl  needs  a  father,  and  she  needs  him 
through  all  the  years  of  her  growing  life.  She  needs 
the  masculine  point  of  view  to  assist  in  the  forming  of 
her  judgments  in  all  questions  that  confront  her  grow- 
ing womanhood.  She  needs  the  dignity  of  his  virility; 
she  needs  to  love  him,  to  believe  in  him  as  the  best  and 
dearest  man  in  the  world ;  she  needs  the  authority  which 
belongs  to  the  masculine  mind ;  she  needs  to  see  some 
elements  of  the  hero  in  her  everyday  father.  One  rea- 
son for  the  qualities  in  our  womanhood  which  people 
of  foreign  nations  like  the  least  is  the  absence  of  a  proper 
balance  between  the  sexes  in  the  control  of  the  home 
and  the  definition  of  its  ideals. 

I  hear  rumors  now  and  then  of  the  wholesale  demoral- 
ization of  our  boys  and  girls.  I  do  not  credit  them.  I 
believe  our  boys  are  clean  and  strong,  and  our  girls  are 
sweet  and  pure.  I  believe  that  anything  that  can  truth- 
fully be  said  to  the  contrary  is  distinctly  exceptional. 

But  now,  talking  not  as  a  minister  to  laymen,  but  as  a 
father  to  fathers,  I  want  to  ask  this  question: 

130 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

You  are  the  father  of  a  young  girl  in  high  school, 
working  too  hard,  under  too  great  a  nervous  strain,  and 
at  a  period  of  her  womanhood  too  critical  for  her  to 
come  to  prayer-meeting  one  hour  froom  8  to  9  o'clock 
on  Wednesday  evening.  About  how  many  evenings  a 
week  ought  she  to  spend  at  the  theater  from  8  to  11? 
About  how  often  ought  she  to  dance  from  8  to  12?  She 
is  a  good,  sensible,  pure,  wholesome  girl,  but  emotional, 
and  with  the  necessity  of  passing  through  the  successive 
stages  of  silliness  and  nonsense  which  are  normal  to 
young  womanhood,  and  which  she  may  be  trusted  to 
pass  safely  if  she  is  helped  and  guided  aright.  But  how 
often  ought  she  to  key  her  emotions  up  to  these  excite- 
ments? 

To  be  sure,  the  other  girls  know  just  what  play  was 
on  the  boards  last  week,  and  what  is  to  be  next  week, 
and  the  relative  merits  of  this  and  that  actor;  but  is  it 
wholesome? 

I  sometimes  go  to  the  theater.  I  sometimes  let  my 
children  go.  I  speak  not  as  a  fanatic  on  this  subject. 
I  simply  ask  you  as  fathers,  about  how  often  do  you 
think  a  young  boy  or  girl  ought  to  go  to  the  theater? 

And  if  you  have  any  convictions  upon  this  subject,  who 
ought  to  settle  the  question?  Ought  the  young  girl  to 
settle  it  on  the  plea  that  "All  the  other  girls  go"?  Or 
ought  you  throw  upon  the  mother  the  responsibility  of 
settling  it?  You  know,  or  ought  to  know,  better  than 
the  mother,  and  you  certainly  know  a  great  deal  better 
than  the  girl,  what  is  best  in  these  matters.  Who  is  the 
head  of  the  house  where  you  live?  Who  settles  questions 
when  your  knowledge  and  experience  ought  to  have 
weight?     Do  you  throw  the   whole  responsibility  upon 

131 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

the  mother?  Or  do  you  let  the  children  settle  these 
questions  alone? 

I  am  not  speaking  against  the  theater.  I  am  speaking 
about  the  father's  duty  to  rule  his  household  well.  Am 
I  speaking  wisely  or  not?  Speaking  as  a  father  to 
fathers,  how  many  times  in  a  school  term  ought  a  young 
girl,  or  even  a  young  boy,  to  be  out  late  and  unguarded, 
attending  the  theater? 

And  is  it  good  for  them  to  have  the  feeling  that  they 
must  be  able  to  compare  this  week's  play  with  last,  and 
to  take  it  for  granted  that  they  are  to  see  the  next,  and 
to  be  able  to  discuss  actors  and  actresses,  and  compare 
them  familiarly?  About  how  large  an  angle  ought  that 
sort  of  thing  to  fill  in  the  life  of  a  growing  boy  or  girl? 
Has  the  father  no  duty  in  this  matter?  Or  is  it  entirely 
the  prerogative  of  the  mother,  or  is  it  to  be  left  to  the 
will  of  the  child?  Speaking  as  a  father  to  fathers.  I 
ask  you,  what  do  you  think  about  it? 

The  most  interesting  and  significant  fact  in  the  social 
life  of  the  human  race  is  its  division  into  two  sexes. 
This  is  a  permanent  fact,  which  has  existed  from  the  cre- 
ation and  must  exist  as  long  as  the  human  race  endures. 
It  is  impossible  for  either  sex  to  exist  in  isolation  and 
to  perpetuate  itself.  The  sexes  are  mutually  and  perma- 
nently interdependent.  The  human  race  can  no  more 
be  kept  alive  with  one  sex  severed  from  the  other  than 
the  human  body  can  live  if  cleft  asunder  from  head  to 
foot  and  divided  into  two  halves.  The  race  would  die 
in  a  single  generation. 

In  view  of  this  fundamental  fact  it  is  perfect  folly  for 
man  to  talk  of  himself  as  man  and  woman  to  talk  of 
herself  as  woman  as  though  either  of  these  facts  con- 

132 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

stituted  an  end  in  itself.  The  fact  of  sex  indicates  a 
compulsory  division  of  labor,  and  upon  that  permanent 
division  the  home  is  established. 

In  many  ages  and  in  many  nations  the  family  has  been 
too  definitely  and  dominantly  masculine,  and  the  part 
of  woman  in  the  home  and  in  society  has  been  ignored. 
That  is  not  our  present  tendency.  The  problem  of  today 
is  to  bring  the  man  out  of  the  mere  laboratory  and  pow- 
er-house and  put  him  with  his  wife  into  the  very  center 
of  the  home,  and  he  cannot  have  his  proper  place  there 
unless  he  is  recognized  as  the  head  of  the  house  in  things 
spiritual  as  well  as  temporal.  To  him  belongs  the  right- 
ful leadership  in  the  educational  and  spiritual  life  of  the 
home. 

I  am  not  seeking  to  put  the  clock  back.  I  am  not 
opposing  the  growing  independence  of  woman.  I  do  not 
even  oppose  giving  woman  the  ballot.  I  am  not  doing 
any  shouting  in  favor  of  it,  for  I  think  we  shall  have 
our  problems  here  after  that  change  comes.  But  I  would 
rather  tone  up  the  manhood  of  our  nation  than  to  add 
an  extra  burden  to  womanhood.  And  while  I  often  speak 
in  praise  of  mothers,  just  for  today,  I  would  rather  ele- 
vate fatherhood  to  its  rightful  place  than  to  talk  plati- 
tudes about  motherhood,  which  has  a  great  and  radiant 
glory  of  its  own.  And  I  would  rather  have  woman  to  be 
man's  companion  than  his  competitor. 

The  neglect  of  'paternal  honor  and  authority  is  re- 
sponsible for  much  decay  in  the  spiritual  and  political 
life  of  our  time.  "Honor  thy  father"  is  a  command  \ve 
need  to  obey,  for  the  sake  of  our  institutions  of  every 
sort.     Homes  are  being  established  which  are   insecure 

133 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

because  of  lack  of  the  discipline  which  would  have  come 
with  more  masculine  influence  within  it. 

A  friend  of  mine,  living  in  New  York,  recently  said  to 
me  that  it  is  simply  appalling  the  number  of  young 
couples  who  come  to  that  city,  reared  in  supposedly 
Christian  homes,  whose  religious  life  is  after  all  so  super- 
ficial that  when  they  enter  into  the  life  of  the  city  they 
become  wholly  worldly  and  are  lost  to  the  church  and 
its  work.  And  much  of  it  he  traces  back  to  this  very 
defect  in  the  homes  from  \\'hich  they  came. 

A  new  definition  of  the  spiritual  value  and  the  responsi- 
bility of  fatherhood  is  one  of  the  crying  needs  of  this 
present  day.  The  father  himself  needs  it  for  his  own 
soul's  sake.  His  wife  needs  that  this  shall  be  so  for  her 
sake,  no  less  than  for  his.  But  for  the  sake  of  the  fam- 
ily ;  for  the  sake  of  society ;  for  the  sake  of  good  citizen- 
ship and  abiding  righteousness  in  coming  generations, 
a  unified  home  life  with  the  father  as  the  spiritual  head 
of  the  house  is  one  of  the  great  needs  of  a  free  church 
and  of  a  righteous,  democratic  government. 

Not  only  is  this  true,  but  every  young  man  ought  to 
live  in  the  light  of  prospective  fatherhood.  To  every 
man  is  committed  a  brief  period  of  responsibility  during 
his  life  in  the  present  generation,  but  an  immeasurably 
greater  responsibility  for  the  influence  he  shall  bequeath 
to  the  world  through  his  posterity.  Whether  he  himself 
is  rich  or  poor,  happy  or  miserable,  is  a  question  of  in- 
finitesimal importance  compared  with  the  question,  what 
kind  of  blood  is  to  flow  through  coming  generations  by 
reason  of  his  contribution  to  the  future  of  the  race. 
Whether  he  is  good  or  bad,  whether  he  goes  to  heaven 
or  hell,  is  less  important  than  this.     A  thousand  years 

134 


THE     GLORY     OF     FATHERHOOD 

after  he  is  dead  and  forgotten  the  manhood  of  the  world 
will  be  richer  or  poorer,  better  or  worse,  by  reason  of 
his  having  lived.  It  is  better  for  him  to  burn  barns,  rob 
banks  and  murder  his  fellow  men  in  cold  blood  than  to 
bequeath  to  the  future  a  dozen  generations  with  body  and 
mind  enfeebled  and  will  less  strong  by  reason  of  his 
unholy  living;  on  the  other  hand,  where  any  man  puts 
into  the  blood  of  the  race  an  added  ring  of  iron  he  con- 
fers upon  society  a  benefit  compared  with  which  endow- 
ment of  colleges  or  the  building  of  libraries  is  not  to  be 
mentioned. 

My  plea  is  for  a  higher  honor  to  be  paid  to  fatherhood. 
I  ask  that  it  be  raised  to  a  plane  level  with  that  to  which 
we  have  exalted  motherhood,  that  these  twain  which  God 
hath  united  may  not  be  put  asunder.  I  ask  for  clean, 
brave,  upright  manhood,  fit  for  the  companionship  of 
pure,  sweet  womanhood,  fit  for  healthy,  righteous 
fatherhood.  Let  us  render  to  fatherhood  a  new  honor; 
and  let  all  fathers  seek  to  be  worthy  of  that  honor.  For 
this  is  the  crowning  glory  of  our  manhood,  that  God  has 
permitted  us  to  be  called  by  that  holy  name  which  Jesus. 
gave  to  men. 

If  ever  you  are  truly  to  hallow  the  name  of  God,  you 
must  hallow  your  ideal  of  fatherhood.  Jesus  compelled 
this  when  He  taught  us  to  pray,  "Our  Father,  who  art  in. 
heaven ;  Hallowed  be  Thy  Name." 


135 


A  PRAYER  FOR  MEN 

The  lack  of  any  adequate  h3'-mns  -or  anthems  appro- 
priate for  such  a  theme  as  that  treated  in  this  sermon 
compelled  some  original  features  in  the  music  which 
accompanied  it.  The  following  words  were  written  for 
the  occasion : 

A  PRAYER  FOR  MEN DONIZETTI 

Music  of  Dresser's  arrangement  of  The  Sextette  from  "Lucia." 
Words  by  Dr.  Barton.     Arranged  by  Mr.  Kinsey. 

We  have  thanked  Thee  for  our  mothers, 

And   we   thank   Thee    still   again; 
Now   for  fathers  and   for  brothers, — 

Lord,  we  thank  Thee  for  good  men! 

For   our   fathers   who   begot   us 

And  who  paths  of  patience   trod, 
And  whose  righteous  manhood  taught  us 

Of  the   Fatherhood  of   God! 

Bless  our  brothers  and  our  neighbors, 

In  their  tasks  of  hand  and  brain; 
Strengthen   all   men    for   their   labors, 

Help  them  bear  the   load  and  strain. 

Bless  the  men  who  face  the  dangers 

Of  the  battle  and  the  sea; 
Guide  the  men  who  roam  as  strangers 

Making  paths  where  roads  shall  be. 

Save  the  manhood   of  our  nation; 

Guide  us  with  Thy  staflf  and  rod; 
Make  each  coming  generation 

Know  the  Fatherhood  of  God. 

For  our  sisters  and  our  mothers 

Oft  we've   prayed   and  pray  again; 
JSIow  for  fathers  and  for  brothers. 

Father,   hear   our   prayer   for   men! 


Kf\t  Vaim  anti  ^ignifiente 
of  %\tt 


Text:  "For  what  is  your  life?  It  is  even  a  vapor,  that  ap- 
peareth  for  a  little  time,  and  then  vanisheth  away."     James  4:14. 

We  hardly  need  to  be  reminded  of  the  brevity  of  life. 

It  is  the  universal  testimony  of  old  men  that  to  them 
life  has  seemed  short.  Even  a  life  of  three  score  years 
and  ten  is  a  restricted  life,  and  if  by  reason  of  strength 
the  years  be  four  score,  yet  the  life  is  soon  cut  ofif. 

All  of  our  plans  are  made  with  the  knowledge  that 
we  may  not  live  to  carry  them  out.  We  press  through 
the  world  with  a  feverish  haste  as  those  who  are  not  to 
be  here  long. 

The  Apostle  James  was  speaking  well  within  bounds 
when  he  compared  life  to  vapor.  Measured  in  the  pro- 
portion of  its  length  to  the  boundless  extent  of  time, 
the  life  of  any  one  man  is  too  brief  to  be  represented  by 
a  vapor ;  measured  by  the  proportion  of  his  bulk  to  the 
mass  of  the  universe  he  is  altogether  too  insubstantial 
and  insignificant  to  be  thought  of  even  as  the  tiniest 
speck  in  a  vapor. 

If  the  man  of  science  be  asked  concerning  human  life 
in  its  relation  either  to  the  stretch  of  time  or  the  bulk 
of  the  universe,  he  would  say  what  James  said,  and  say 
it  more  emphatically. 

If  we  take  a  handful  of  marbles,  one  of  them  large 
and  glistening,  the  others  small,  and  varied  in  size, 
and  roll  them  around  in  a  silk  hat,    we    might    get   a 

137 


THE    VALUE    AND    SIGNIFICANCE    OF    LIFE 

scale  for  the  measurement  of  our  solar  system  in  its 
relation  to  the  rest  of  the  univese. 

Placing  that  solar  system  in  Chicago,  with  our  world 
perhaps  as  a  pea  among  the  marbles,  one  might  start 
and  walk  to  Cleveland  one  way  and  to  Omaha  the 
other  before  he  began  to  fmd  many  of  our  nearer  neigh- 
bors among  the  fixed  stars,  and  the  world  is  not  wide 
enough  for  us  working  upon  that  scale  of  proportion  to 
reach  anywhere  near  the  edge  of  the  visible  universe 
in  which  our  sun  is  a  mere  speck  of  golden  dust — one 
of  the  smaller  stars  in  the  Milk}^  Way. 

In  such  a  universe,  what  is  a  solar  system  like  ours? 

What  is  our  world,  and  what  is  man? 

"God  made  a  million  atoms,  each  by  mortals  called  a  'world;' 
Like  dust-motes  in  a  beam  of  light,  they  dartled,  circled,  whirled; 
Yet  all  these  million  worlds,  compared  to  all  His  might  did  rule, 
Were  in  the  Universal   Whole  one  tiny  molecule. 

'"The  mortals  on  these  shining  specks  spake  of  God's  space  as 

'far,' 
And    every    bright    companion-mote    they    hailed    as    'world'    or 

'star.' 
(They    should    have    known    the    Eternal    Mind      no      need    for 

measures  hath; 
God  looketh  down  the  Milky  Way  as  down  a  garden  path; 
The  distance  from  our  outmost  sun  unto  His  throne,  no  doubt, 
Is  a  handsbreadth  in  His  seeing,  or  too  small  to  measure  out.) 

'"These    manikins    then    fought    and    died    on    many    a    shining 

mote — 
For  what  they  dubbed  as  'empires'  s\A^orded  one  another's  throat; 
Each  nation  on  its  anthill   swarmed  and  sang  a  patriot  song, 
And  stormed  another  anthill  to  avenge  an  emmet  wrong: 
And  thus  they  hated,  loved  and  lived  until  the  end  of  time. 
While  up  the  weary  rounds  of  life  a  million  worlds  did  climb. 

'"Then  flash!     Two  molecules  collide  and  worlds  exhale  in  mist. 
And  back  into  a  fiery  ring  do  melted  empires  twist. 
And  cities  in  solution  hang  and  drop  in  fiery  rain, 
And  the  sinew  of  the  tiger  fuses  with  the  poet's  brain; 
All  back  into  one  element  trees,  mountains,  oceans,   glide. 
And  not  one  life  is  left  to  strut  and  swell  in  pompous  pride — 

138 


THE    VALUE    AND    SIGNIFICANCE    OF    LIFE 

''Then  some  far-worlded  telescope  which  chance  did  thither  turn 
Beholds  this  starry  funeral  pyre  minutely  flame  and  burn. 
'Lo!'  thinks  the  awed  astronomer,  his  star-map  at  his  side. 
'Upon  yon  utmost  verge  of  night  a  star  was  born  and  died.' 
"And  so  they  numbered  eons  there,  and  cherished  histories  gray! 
Oh,   but   they   battled,    loved    and   dreamed    for   a   clock-tick   in 
God's  day!" 

— Harry  H.  Kemp  in  The  Independent. 

Life  is  a  vapor.  But  what  is  a  vapor?  It  is  all  that 
it  ever  has  been.  It  was  a  pearly  raindrop  that  fell  down 
from  the  skies :  and  as  it  fell,  it  brightened  and  made 
beautiful  the  flower  in  whose  golden  heart  it  lay,  and 
then,  dropping  to  the  earth,  watered  the  root  that  there 
might  be  other  flowers ;  and  then,  by  subterranean 
channels  breaking  forth  into  a  spring,  it  flowed  singing 
to  the  sea,  turning  the  wheels  of  industry  as  it  w^ent, 
and  laughing  in  the  sunlight  as  it  bore  great  ships  upon 
its  blue  bosom. 

The  sun  caught  it  up  and  it  vanished  into  heaven,  smil- 
ing as  it  rose.  All  this  the  vapor  was  and  is;  all  this 
it  did  and  does.  It  appeareth  for  a  little  while  and  then 
vanisheth  away. 

But  when  it  vanishes  it  rises  fragrant  with  the  odor  of 
the  flowers  it  has  refreshed,  dignified  by  the  burdens  it 
has  borne,  radiant  with  the  honor  of  thirst  it  has 
quenched,  and  jubilant  in  the  memories  of  service  it  has 
rendered. 

It  vanishes  away,  but  as  it  vanishes,  the  sun  catches 
it  up  into  heaven  pours  through  it  the  sevenfold  glory 
of  its  prismatic  splendor,  and  imparts  to  it  a  radiance 
fit  for  the  diadem  of  God. 

It  vanishes  away,  but  as  it  vanishes  it  smiles  in  the 
glow  of  promise  of  joyful  service  still  to  be,  and  its 
rainbow   gladdens   the   eyes  of   men   and   reminds   them 

139 


THE    VALUE   AND    SIGNIFICANCE    OF    LIFE 

of  the  covenant  of  God. 

There  are  lives  like  that.  They  appear  for  a  little  time 
and  then  vanish  away.  But  they  come  to  earth  trailing 
clouds  of  glory,  and  they  vanish  fragrant  with  the 
memories  of  a  beautiful  and  varied  ministry  to  their 
fellow  men. 

They  flow  through  the  channel  of  their  years,  leave 
behind  them  holy  and  sacred  memorials,  and  when  they 
vanish  they  overarch  the  two  worlds ;  at  this  end  are 
glorious  memories,  and  the  gold  at  the  other  end  of 
their  rainbow  is  the  pavement  of  the  city  of  God. 

And  the  vapor  is  not  lost.  It  is  one  of  the  certain- 
ties of  modern  scienc  that  every  particle  of  the  vapor 
abides.    It  disappears,  but  it  is  indestructible.    We  see  it : 

"Like  the  snowdrop  in  the  river, 

A  moment  white,  then  fades  forever." 

Forever?     No!     It  has  fallen,  faded,  risen  and  blessed 

the  world  a  million  times ;  and  unborn  generations  will 

see  it,  taste  it,  and  be  refreshed  by  it. 

There  are  lives  like  that.  They  come  to  earth,  live, 
love  and  pass  away.  But  they  are  not  lost.  The  sweet 
influences  by  which  they  made  life  better  are  added  to 
the  invisible  cords  that  bind  the  world  to  the  throne 
of  God.     They  are  not  lost.     They  live,  and  live  forever. 


140 


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